


An American Werewolf in Notting Hill

by anenglishwolf



Category: Black Books, Notting Hill (1999), Shaun of the Dead, Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Actors, Black Books - Freeform, Bookstore AU, M/M, Notting Hill AU, Sean of the Dead, bookshop au, film student!Stiles, writer!stiles
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-08-31
Updated: 2015-06-07
Packaged: 2018-02-15 15:02:16
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 9
Words: 26,813
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2233389
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/anenglishwolf/pseuds/anenglishwolf
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Derek Hale may just be the biggest film-star in the world.  In Stiles' humble opinion, he's certainly the hottest.  And Stiles knows from hot film-stars - after all, he works in William Thacker's travel bookshop, while doing the exchange student thing in London, England.  </p><p>Yeah, that William Thacker - former resident of Notting Hill, now married to superstar Anna Scott.  Who is rumoured to be making a werewolf film in the UK with - guess who - Derek Hale...</p><p>Is Stiles going to get to meet the crush of his life?</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. In which Stiles spills coffee, looks like an idiot and meets Derek Hale

**Author's Note:**

> This chapter isn't even PG, but there will be maturity eventually. Well, of a kind anyway.

For an American citizen of Polish extraction, Stiles is feeling pretty darn British these days. Give him a monocle, plus-fours and a broken bottle, he won't know whether to hug you or mug you. He's out-Britishing the Brits, and the Polish thing is just protective coloration, considering the local immigrant population.

Eighteen months into grad student life in London, dear old Blighty, and Stiles is still loving it. Even and despite Jeremy Kyle. Despite deep-fried Bounty bars, and fucking bizarro E4 trailers. (Motherfucking purple, so much of it. Everything else about them, he can almost live with by now.)

He's perfected his MLE consonantal mangling and slurring. (And can infuriate Scott over Skype, by refusing to speak in anything else. So that twenty minutes pass by of "Fuck, man, talk English, talk American, talk so I can understand what you're saying!" while Stiles responds with "Bu' then we finished raaa-ownd his ends, sweet, ya get me?", following with the requisite incoherent gurgle in the back of the throat.)

He has a pie 'n' mash addiction, drinks the liquor from the jug, knows where every Witherspoons is to be avoided, and is a proud habitue of the BM reading room. (Okay, he still hasn't quite mastered the rules of soccer, and and its attendant sociological niceties. But after William used Anna's contacts to wangle him and Boyd season tickets, it seems rude not to pretend to be as obsessed with the funny little pseudo-sport – they don't even need any protection, Chrissake, it's for girls – as the rest of the nation.)

He's gone native, and he loves it. If he could only ship all of his family and friends over here, onto the soil that Blake and Wordsworth gibbered about ecstatically, to breathe the air that Boudicea and Mrs Thatcher and Baby Spice once breathed, then he totally would, and never want to leave.

There's just so much of it. So much to do. So much meat and material in his grad course, so much deadline frenzy. And as well as so much studying, so much work. He has a great transfer student agreement, an international scholarship, a special honours honorarium. But funds are still tight. If he didn't work at William's travel bookshop, then he would have trouble affording the Daddies brown sauce to put on his black pudding and fried bread at breakfast time.

But he does. Does make a point of consuming every single nasty joke food the locals persist in foisting off on him as a delicacy, then marvelling as he actually god damn eats it. Does make ends meet, with his handy book-store assistant gig, ideal for grad students and for his butterfly brain, coming up with scads of trivia for every new customer.

Does work at William's travel book-shop. William Thacker's travel book-shop. William, husband of Anna Thacker. Or, as she still tends to be known when the name is up in lights at premieres, Anna Scott.

God damn. Lucked out on that one.

And he's almost as star-struck about it, five months on from getting his ass hired, as he was to begin with, even now. Most of the time. The time that isn't this time, flying early out of a seminar and hauling his ass and his Oyster card, arse over tit, and into the Tube from Euston Square to Notting Hill Gate station. He fights though ravening hordes of of merry slow-as-fuck travellers, lounging through the gates. And he finally gives up on getting in on time, slowing to a walk, and enjoying the byplay of all Limey life, through the market on Portobello Road.

Boyd isn't going to bust his ass if he's late. Martin won't even notice, the soft touch. Too busy hanging out with Rufus and chatting inconsequentially about fine dining and cheap wine. (That, under the guise of keeping surveillance over the reprobate, making sure no expensive tomes make their way down the placket of his pants. Their friendly neighbourhood shoplifter, every bookshop needs one. Last time, Martin made him a coffee, for Christ's sake. After Boyd had wrestled him to the ground in his attempt at flight, and apprehensively, distastefully retrieved Paris In Colour from down his ass crack).

And Thacker, well, Thacker is barely ever on the premises any more. Or even the landmass. Too busy massaging his sputtering screenwriter/travel writer/husband to the stars gig, and keeping the missus happy via babysitting and arm-candy duties. So Stiles getting his ass busted by the tweedy English gent, the proprietor of the establishment, isn't much of a concern, either.

And turns out he's right, quite right not to be unduly worried. When he pushes open the weathered door of the shop, varnish almost disappeared off the teak after endurance of years of London downpours – Thacker, you're married to a movie-star, for God's sake, you can afford to get your shop-door re-varnished – he is not greeted by the shop's amiable patron, feet up behind the till, eye-creases expanding out like the sun's rays as he beams at Stiles, hair a-floppin' as it generally does.

No. No, it's Anna Scott who nips up behind him as he gets the door shut, bell a-ringin', and slaps his ass with a fancy-pants designer hand-bag. "Late!" she yells. "What do we pay you for, anyway, Stilinski?"

Oh Christ. Why did nobody warn him that the missus was on the premises?

It's Boyd behind the till, leaning up against the shelves behind him and grinning at Stiles like someone who's already been shanghaied by a crazy famous lady. He's clearly just happy to see it's someone else's turn on the receiving end. And Martin peers out from between the stacks, and smirks at Stiles. "Oh, deigned to bless us with your company, have you, Stiles love? So charmed and grateful. Darling Anna was just saying how much the place benefits from the little ray of sunshine that is inimitably you, when you choose to bless us. The gloom we suffer when you're absent, doing... whatever."

"Little ray of sunshine my fabulous ass!" Anna squawks, though, and stalks in the direction of the backroom. "Stiles! Latte! Now! And I want a caramel cookie! Tomika! Stanley! Guess who's babysitting this afternoon?"

And the two little Scott-Thacker demons come barrelling out from between the stacks – doing their level best to knock poor Martin over in the process, scooting between his legs on their way, like the toddler mini-demons that they are. He has to clutch at the shelves to stay upright, and bangs his head on the top shelf.

"Stiii-iii-iiiles!" li'l Tommy howls, with Stan bringing up the rear, hanging on to her shoulder for stability, and gazing up at a doomed Stiles with huge-eyed pity. And Tommy reaches out and jiggles at the knee of his khakis, worrying it insistently. "Pite Pete Potty. Now!"

Fuck. Pite Pete Potty, otherwise known as Pirate Pete's Potty, these little imps' favourite picture book. He supposes it could be worse. It could have been The Dinosaur That Pooped A Planet. Dinos freak him out. Too much Jur. Park at a formative age.

Stiles is fucked, his afternoon is fucked, his working day is fucked. And this is the reason that he's not quite as starstruck about Anna Scott being his Boss-by-transitive-property as he was five months ago.  
_____

Half an hour later he's holed up in the back room with Anna, the kids and Boyd, reading Pite Pete Potty for the umpteenth time. It's okay. It's a very refined torture, but one that he's used to by now, intermittently. Martin's on till duty, and is the only one with a shot of Scotch in his coffee, since he's the only one technically working currently, and official shop manager to boot. That's how the Thacker travel book-shop rolls, and it doesn't seem to do business any harm. Although that might have something to do with its notoriety as the property of Anna Scott's husband, the tantalizing. lingering possibility for the clientèle that they might at any moment spot her on the premises.

Since the wedding, the place has gone great guns, done amazing business. All new employees are trained in the finer points of glaring at gawkers and hopefuls with no intention of buying, just hanging out on the off-chance, until they're shamed into making a purchase, just to justify their continued presence. Anna actually turns up maybe every couple of months (and doesn't exactly offer to do a stint on the till when she does), and Thacker still less frequently now. But hope springs eternal in the stalker's heart.

Anna slumps back in her chair – best one in the house, obviously, as befits her rank as a great lady, the boss's missus and an international celebrity. "Stiles, you should be a barista. Not that I'm hinting for a refill, or anything. You know, I might steal you away from Will and take you on location with me as my personal coffee-maker, errand-boy and chew-toy."

Stiles finishes off the last page, the last line of Pite Pete. He shoots a cautious glance at the kids. Tomika's torturing a spider, cupping it in her hand, letting it think it's free, cupping it again... Stan is spark out, leaning against Stiles' calf. That's a temporary reprieve. After only six re-readings, too! Result. He's free for adult conversation again. And is eager, excited. "Yeah! Really? Because I would definitely be down with that, that would be cool. Would you, like, introduce me to people? Because I swear to god I am halfway through writing that film script I told you about, the fantasy one, and my Creative Lit writing buddy thinks it's halfway decent and - "

Anna's giving him the interested, wide smile, and the intermittent nod. He's seen that somewhere before. On half of her interviews? But Boyd is laughing at him – leaning back, arms folded, quietly snickering. When he gets it, and shuts up, dejected, Anna laughs too. That nodding and smiling – when an interviewer tries flirting, or asks an egregiously unacceptable question he's never going to get an answer to in this lifetime, and she just nods and smiles him into silence, submission. That's the one.

Anna is a darling, though. When she's not being an asshole, and laughing at him. She reaches over and pats his arm, only a mite patronising. "I can't do that, sweetheart. Will gets a teeny bit possessive about his staff." She mimes exactly how possessive with thumb and forefinger, pouting the while. "Plus I need the childcare when I'm in town. Maybe when my little angels are in kindergarten." Stan burps quietly as she speaks. And Tommy picks the spider up and heads for the window. She clearly has great plans for its future, the miniature mad evil genius.

"Dreamkiller," Stiles burbles sulkily, down into the holey carpet. (These people. This shop. All the money in the world and it's still clearly an old Giles-lair, where Slayers probably come to learn to drink tea, without looking as if it's pickling their innards.) "Spirit-crusher."

"Cheer up, man," Boyd says, quite kindly. He throws the top of his fizzy Vimto bottle in Stiles' direction, and hits him too, pinging painfully on the nose. High school lacrosse has clearly paid off big-time. With the skills he's nurtured, he can assault Stiles with swingeing impunity whenever he feels like it, deadeye accuracy of aim and all. "Maybe she can hook you up with an intro. You know, to our Beacon Hills boy in Hollywood. Now that she's filming with him and all."

That right there is where time jars and stills, clotting into solidity like chronological yoghurt. Because Stiles knows that of which Boyd speaks. And a minute ago he was thinking that, although Boyd is his only buddy from back home, from the good old BHHS days... Here in Blighty, his company is actually getting pretty dispensable. At least, if all the use he's going to be is throwing bottle-tops at Stiles, and not helping him persuade Anna into facilitating Stiles' future Oscar-winning screen-writing career. Not that Boyd ever has much to say, was never going to burst into eloquent speech, pleas to wring Anna's stony little heart, get her to give up a little influence and pull and completely reasonable nepotism on behalf of her hubbie's practically-adopted-son/employee. But he could have grunted affirmatively when Stiles was making his pitch, at the very least.

But right now, right now he kind of loves Boyd. Right now Boyd is king. Later, he will kiss Boyd, possibly. Will smooch the lips off his big handsome taciturn face. Erica's a continent and an ocean away, she can't do a thing about it. Just this minute, though, Stiles is leaning in towards Anna, like he's got her on the ropes. He has the goods on her. She has been holding out on Stiles, and that's not gonna fly, no sir.

Anna holds her ground, stares at him sceptically, much in the manner of one thinking "Bring it on, monkey-boy. Show me whatcha got." Still. He raises one menacing eyebrow at her. "You're making a film with Derek Hale? Are you? Is that what he's saying?" He looks urgently from her to Boyd – who looks to have lost interest, and is possibly dozing off a little – and back again. "Are you making a film with Hale the Magnificent, and if so, how did I not know about this already? What the hell is going on here?"

Anna makes prissy faces at him, stands and leans over to grab a snoozing Stanley, from where the small agent of destruction is still dozing against Stiles' pants-leg. "Mind the cussing, monkey-boy! My babies don't need to hear it!"

Her babies are future sociopathic red-carpet next-generation starlets, who'll be drugging and shagging their way through the headlines from the mid-teens on, Stiles privately thinks. But whatever. He leans forward with his hands on his knees and a beseeching face. "But aaaare you? Are you making a film with the King of Stubble? Can I watch? Can I bring him water and mop his brow after fight scenes? Can I be your body double for the kissin'?"

"Put him out of his misery, Anna," Boyd murmurs. He's occupied, retrieving Tommy from her attempt to send Spidey on a extra-window suicide mission (and haplessly join him). She wails happily in his arms, then conks out suddenly. Both the little monsters adore Boyd.

Anna relents. "Well. There are negotiations happening," she concedes, and Stiles sucks in an eager breath, possibly a little pathetic. "I may be making a werewolf movie with him, although God knows when. Or why. But there are discussions going on. Ongoing. I just can't decide if I'll look good in pelt and a tail," she muses.

"What does William think?" Boyd asks, arching a beautifully sculpted brow. Then adds, "Oh, knock it off, Stiles." Stiles is doing a victory dance round the tiny back-room, already crowded with three adults, two toddler bodies and various broken down bits of office furniture. He's irrepressible, now, cannot be contained.

"Yeah, it's meant to be," Stiles says, leaping up and down a bit, unable to contain his excitement. "I missed my chance back when he was getting home-schooled in Beacon Hills, and the town hardly knew the Hales existed out in the backwoods. But now, Anna's going to invite me to celebrity shindigs, and on-set, and we're gonna strike up a beautiful friendship and you're talking to the future Mr Hale-Stilinski, here, Boyd, so don't you forget it. That right, Anna? Isn't that right? I mean, we all know that now and then you gods of the movie pantheon deign to look down and fall for a mere mortal, right? We've all got reason to know it, right? Hey, is William still cutting his toenails at the breakfast bar, or have you broken him of it yet, A?"

Anna looks up at him with a gently wondering expression, like she's wondering how fast the emergency services can get here with the strait-jacket. Her arms are full of a teeny softly whining Stanley, and she looks down at him and shakes her head, her lovely, only slightly botox'ed mouth twitching with laughter.

Stiles is nohow noway giving up, though. He gets down on one knee before her, so that she can't avoid his face, and pouts, a lot. Like a lot, lot. "You're going to make sure I meet him, at least, aren't you? Right? Right? You wouldn't make a whole movie with Derek Hale and never wangle me an invite so I get to meet him at least once? C'mon there. You don't fool me. I know you love little Stiles. Little Stiles has wormed his way into your stony starry heart, lady, admit it, admit it, go on, admit it..."

Something gives and relaxes in Anna's face, and she allows him a smile that's almost barely sarcastic. "I have a feeling it's time for your dose, Stiles. Well. Stop hassling me, and I'll bear it in mind. Maybe. As long as you promise not to land me, my agent, the film company or your university department with a sexual harassment suit. Or really go all-out stalking. It just might happen. Now shut up and go find your Adderall."

Stiles does some more cheering and whooping, and manages to properly wake both kids up. Amongst the ensuing brouhaha and hoo-ha, both employees trying to chit-chat and gee them back into a good humour, Anna's phone rings, and she takes the call.

By the time Stiles is finished calming Stanley down, jiggling him and singing a Haribo commercial, since he can't remember a lullaby off-hand, she's nearly done. "Yeah. Yes. Where are you? Okay, then, but - . Okay. See ya." And she cuts it off with a little smirk in her eyes, gazing blankly right at Stiles.

Stiles has never gone the MILF route, possibly because no cougar has ever given him the come-on, and he has enough trouble with guys and girls his own age. But he can objectively admit that, after twelve years of marriage (to a superhumanly tolerant and criminally charming feckless waster, book-store owner and dilettante), two kids, an acrimonious lawsuit with her last management company, and public rows with half her deadbeat opportunistic family, Anna Scott is still sufficiently terrifyingly beautiful to leave him half-hypnotized, along with half the other males in the world, and he would - . Aah. He would respect her deeply on all imaginable occasions, and has never had a dirty thought in relation to his employer's wife. Nope. You can't prove a thing.

(William Thacker is a very personable guy, who has been known, in a good mood, to shut up the shop when he blows into town, take his employees to lunch, get them rat-arsed on Pims and take them all on the Eye until one of them pukes. He has also, in Stiles' line of sight at a bar mitzvah afterparty (Stiles was running childcare and interference) where some proud parent was getting too friendly with Anna – who was perhaps getting a little bit friendly back – spiked the guy's drink, pantsed him in the gents and then turned him loose – and bewildered – in the events room. So. Deep respect, and a little bit of apprehension. And Anna herself, well, Anna has a way of cutting you into tiny pieces with the most charming words that ever diced up a nosy journalist into fricassee.)

Sometimes Anna is more scary than others. Now, she's looking at him with a gentle smile, like the first warm beams of sun in January, lighting up the dawning of the year. It sends chills of unease crawling through his gut, mercury trickles.

But all she says to him is, "Stiles, honey. I would so very much appreciate another of your wonderful lattes."

And now she's being sweet. Fuck, they might as well set the slasher movie chords off swooping up and down in the background and have done with it. But he sets off to the kitchen cubicle, behind the curtain, and does milady's bidding. Because he's a good little peon. And the general rule of thumb that he follows is, when your employer's lovely missis is an international film-star who could do you a solid and make you rich one day, then when she says jump you say, "Off of London Bridge ma'am? Sure thing."

Boyd jabs him in the ass as he goes. "Tea for me, loser." Boyd has gone almost as far native as Stiles at this point. He's addicted to Made In Chelsea, and will compare the merits of the Baby Made In Chelsea trailers versus Haribo adults-talk-baby ads. Not in a mocking way, either. It's probably Stiles' fault for encouraging him.

As Stiles is washing cups and setting the coffee drip going behind the shabby beaded curtain – god! - there's a ding of the bell out front, and Martin yells from behind the till. It's incoherent, but he's probably wanting to be relieved, and maybe sulking that no-one's offered him hot beverage-type refreshment. There's a lot of chuntering as Boyd and Anna shuffle out, with the odd yawp from the still uneasily dreaming kiddies. So he's alone, lonely, with the cups and the peeling plasterboard for company, fixing coffee like he's not the great future screen-writing hope of Beacon Hills. Never mind. World domination is just a little further off than he thought initially, that's all.

But Martin does pop back to keep him company, anyhow. Or to put another order in. He pokes his head around the curtain, looking no more like a questing ferrety hamster today than he normally does. Which is to say, still quite a lot. "Tea for me, love, please Stiles. And can we have a cappuccino for our customer?"

They're not a books 'n' coffee joint. God knows why not at this point, because surely every other book store on the planet is, so why are they holding out? Except for the fact that Thacker's a dinosaur, who only really keeps the shop going out of habit, hobbyism and sentimentality at this point. Who are they to argue, to look a gift horse in the mouth? To point out to him that their jobs depend on his inability to let go the sacred little bit of Notting Hill where his girl first stepped o'er the threshold, and he tipped hot coffee down her?

Or Stiles believes the story runs something like that, in any case. Little old Brit shopkeeper has a wistful thing for big movie star girl. Big movie star girl happens in his shop one day, likes the cut of his jib, and he pours hot beverage over her, for this is the mating ritual of the lesser-spotted British shop-keeper. They shag like bunnies – this much detail has never been gone into for his benefit, or in the truncated versions that hit Anna's interviews. But he assumes, because most Brits seem to shag like bunnies, and that's how they tend to put it as well. Well, that's the clean version. Then the tragic misunderstanding, the tittie shots, the long separation and the big mushy sappy ending. And the romantic fadeout.

Then twelve years. Stiles has seen a bit of those twelve years, this latter fag-end, from an outsider's occasional viewpoint. It seems to involve a fair bit of yelling about dry-cleaning, whose responsibility it is to fire the incompetent new PA, sometime somebody shagged or didn't shag the nanny, and exactly who swore in front of little Tommy darling, since now the c-word is her new favourite thing. But also: hugs, and dumbass shared jokes that they frequently insist on explaining when nobody, for sure, wants to know. And a huge morass of sentimentality about the book-shop, and England, and Notting Hill, and their courtship and their life in general. More hugs. They seem mostly happy.

Stiles wouldn't mind being them when he grows up. Either one of them. Or half of them, you know, you see.

But back to the menu as advertised – two extra drinks, fuck him, fuck Martin, and what are they doing making customers drinks too? Fuck it, is this a new sales drive thing? Do they really need it? They have Anna in the front of the shop, for fucks sake, probably posing photogenically near the window with an adorable cherub in her arms. Lingering by the aisle with the most expensive coffee-table books on Peru and Moldavia, giving stink-eye to anyone who picks one up then puts it down again. (Anna is fearsome as a saleswoman. Just saying, if she ever felt like giving up the giddy hurdy-gurdy of the Hollywood merry-go-round, then she could for sure enter the feverish cut-throat glamorous world of book-selling, and possibly even meet her sales targets within the first six months.

But he makes the drinks, and he trays 'em up, since he's weighed down, and he gets his ass out there like a good little book-seller should.

Through the elaborate 70s glittery beaded curtain, and Anna and Martin have their heads together at the till, the kids are playing helter skelter around the aisles again, and Boyd is up by the Eastern European section, explaining some heavyweight tome to what must be the favoured customer. Martin and Anna barely look at or speak to him when he hits 'em up with top of the line java, fuck 'em. He tosses the kids the egg n' bacon candy that was mouldering on the cubicle shelves – let Anna get the hyperactive benefit in half an hour when she's on the way to her swanky Ritz suite – and heads towards Boyd. He's got the customer's coffee ready to hand first, right, because, customer = guest. Maybe. Kind of.

"Sir?" he asks politely. "You're having a cappucino?" Boyd is giving him some variant of a boogly-eyed meaningful look. Mostly it seems to be made up of smirk, but not all. Customer guy has on a suit that is criminally nice, nicer even than Thacker's Savile row dandy nonsense, now he's an expensively-kept man. And this guy has the bod for it too. Nice hair, a teeny bit over-producted. Good cheek-bones, Stiles can tell even from this angle. And as he turns -

Oh, fuck. Oh, fuck him. Fuck Stiles. Fuck Stiles' life. Fuck coffee. Fuck Boyd, who has a great malicious grin spread across his face.

It's Derek Hale, it's actually Derek Hale, that Derek Hale, the one and only Derek Hale.

Derek Hale, who's just watched, face immobile, as Stiles' mouth drops open, and his hand jerks up. His hand that's holding the cappuccino that he resentfully – er, lovingly – prepared just minutes before. So, where the cappuccino itself winds up is on the floor, and absent of that, largely over Stiles.

It's hot, and uncomfortable, and Stiles doesn't even care. A few drops have spattered their way onto Hale's pretty suit, too. He looks down – his inhumanly beautiful face still quite expressionless – and examines them. That's before he whips a handkerchief out of his top pocket, and has at it, wiping them away with delicate distaste, immaculately modelled lips tensing and straightening faintly.

A few moments of perfect silence ring out across the not very impressive length and breadth of the shop, while the situation sinks in. Then Martin cries out – the toe-rag – "Well done! Couldn't have done better myself!"

And Anna snickers a little bit, vile Lilith that she is. Then sings out, "It's like we just took a journey through time and space, boys. This could be the start of something beautiful. Invite me to the wedding!" She is a terrible woman, a terrible, terrible woman, and Stiles will never again devote any private time to mentally hooking her up with Lydia, plus or minus Star Trek or elf costumery.

But he can't, right now, spare the time to glare or remonstrate with her, not that it will do the least good, with her unrepentant film-starry ass. He has apologies to make, dry-cleaning recompenses to offer, repairs to make to this disastrous informal introduction to the lust of his life and –

Hale's leaving. Hasn't even spared him an angry word, a further glance. What, what the fuck, no, unacceptable. "Anyway, Anna, take a read through and let me know what you think. If we're both up to speed with the Deaton meeting it'll go better, yeah?" His voice is light and quiet, that familiar unobtrusive menace and charm still echoing through it from a handful of already classic movies from the ex-teen-star. The Beacon Hills teen star.

"See you, hon," Anna trills out like a bell, but no, Stiles isn't having this. He's after the man and at the door with him.

"Aah, I've got to apologise man, so sorry about that. Let me make you another, come and sit down, I don't want to drive you away on your first visit to a historic London landmark. I'm Stiles, and I guess Anna will have told you about me. Love all your films! I used to watch your Teen Vamp show waaaay back, man, and you should know I'm a Beacon Hills BHHS alum too so you're pretty much a legend there, there's a whole display cabinet set up to celebrate your lacrosse career and – "

If he's babbling it's justified, Stiles feels. Especially when it actually manages to halt Hale in his escape, right as he opens the door. He turns and actually gives Stiles a thorough look, up and down, which is a little bit worrying. Stiles generally feels that his major attractions reside between his ears. Which is also a worry, with some of the reactions he gets. He shuts up, now he has Hale's undivided attention. Actually, he suddenly can't talk, and can feel a vivid flush starting up round his neck and creeping up to his cheeks.

And wow, he gets a slight smile. Not the really toothy dazzling one from Hale's last but one cop buddy movie. But a little, and it warms him right through. "Cute." Hale's eyebrows are doing something that might be derisive, but isn't hostile. "I'll take a raincheck on the coffee. I don't really have time anyway, but Anna insisted. Something about keeping your hands busy and your mouth distracted." His eyes seem to stray over Stiles' mouth, too, momentarily.

"Offer him apricots in honey, Stiles," Anna yells. She's sitting on the till counter, now, openly gawping, drinking them in. Tommy is chewing the corner of her expensively hand-tatted French lace cardigan. Anna and Thacker have a whole apricots in honey running gag, that is never explained, but they will never shut up about it, as if it's the most hilarious thing in the world.

And Stiles is too busy glaring at her to keep his eye on the ball, to offer further inducements to Derek Hale to curl up in this little bookshop and never leave, be Stiles' love-slave and general permanent romantic love interest. There's a, "Later, Anna," from Hale's side, and the door's shutting, failing to click with the general down-at-heel don't-careness of the whole establishment. Hale's gone.

Oh, fuck it. Stiles sinks back against the door, then thinks again, turns and flips the sign to CLOSED, sinks back against it again. "He didn't even slam me into anything," he moans, to his audience in general. He does in fact have wide attention. "I poured hot coffee over him and he didn't break my face or push me into a wall or threaten me with immediate bodily harm. What is wrong with that guy? I just met Derek Hale and he was a terrible disappointment. Anna, I hate you."

Anna's only snickering, and Stiles has a feeling she doesn't take him seriously for some reason. "Don't worry, hon. You can always turn it around. Based on experience, you could have a long way to go yet."

"Why would you want him to beat you up, in any case?" Martin asks, fussily re-ordering the Americas section. "I didn't know you were up for a bit of rough trade, dear. I'll have to take you with me clubbing next weekend."


	2. In which Stiles is possibly being stalked by a movie star.  Maybe.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Is Stiles being stalked by filmstar Derek Hale? _Is_ he? 
> 
> In any case, he's inept with the hot beverages. Again.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> OFC introduced for light relief.

"Yeah, hawk my ass all over little old London town, why don't you," Stiles says moodily. "It'll be the most action I've got since I got over here, anyway."

"Liar," Anna calls out sweetly. "I heard about your drag-queen adventures last time your Beacon Hills girlfriends came over to visit. Anyway," she adds – and oh, Stiles knows that speculative look on her lovely, demonic face. Tommy looks up at her, then follows her gaze, so that's two evil womenfolk with their attention totally trained upon a hapless, hopeless, sodden Stiles. Great. Tommy gums at wet lace some more, then gives an interested gurgle. Stiles has never felt so disrespected by someone not yet two years old.

"Yes," Anna muses. "Anyway, now Derek's in town maybe your luck will change. I could give you all kinds of advice about courting a movie star. William could give you all kinds of advice. You only have to ask, little Stiles-y. We could coach you on how to court him, how to stalk your prey and corner him and hunt him down until he gives in out of sheer exhaustion and boredom. There'll be no escape, Stiles. There'll be – "

Oh, hell with it. Stiles has had enough, he calls foul, red cards the whole bloody boiling of them, and he slams out for an unscheduled mental health break. They're all cackling after him, barring Stan, who's started wibbling and snivelling a bit. Anna's the loudest, Boyd the softest but still surprisingly malicious, and Martin calls out, "Don't worry, we'll hold your job open until you get back! Maybe!"

He's not worried by the threat. That, also, isn't how Thacker's Travel Bookshop rolls. He's provided those hounds of hell with some amusement, with a torture victim for the afternoon, and that constitutes about a fifth of his unofficial job description. So he stands about in the dim British afternoon sunlight for a moment or two, looking about moodily. Then on impulse, he heads off for the Greek deli two streets away. He doesn't really need more coffee, not with its current associations for him especially. But they do awesome baklava also, and he needs a little sugar. He's not getting any in any other direction, after all.

The hard-faced Greek girl on the other side of the counter – hair-netted, pink-overalled and solidly built – seems to have a bit of a thing for him, although he gets nothing off her barring his order, change and hard stares from her slabby face. He can tell because his portions are ridiculously over-the-top, enough to give him diabetes when he goes for the candy. At least somebody loves him... and he shouldn't get the coffee, when there's the perfectly good legit beans back at the bookshop, but the Greek brew is also delectable in a completely different way, especially when Yolanda – that's what the manager calls her, anyway, it's not like they're on official buddy-buddy terms – gives him extra syrup and cream in it. Which she does.

So he stands before the counter, and takes a sip, and moans a little bit. It's not the caffeine, or the scent, or even the syrup, really. It's just – heat, and comfort, and someone giving him a little extra, a little unspoken warmth. Because they've been giving him a hard time, the Thacker Travel Bookshop assholes. Nobody knows the trouble he's seen. "I've had a really crap day," he tells Yolanda, meeting her eye across the counter, as she lazily swipes a cloth over it, and her gaze lingers over the unusually empty shop premises. This is the most conversation he's ever attempted with her, pretty unusually for him, he knows. He's a little bit scared of Yolanda. She looks like she could break him with her pinkie. Even if she was doing it affectionately. Like being loved up by a lady gorilla.

"Oh yeah?" she answers, and it's not the most riveted response he's ever gotten. But he's used to pressing on in the face of indifference or, for that matter, open hostility. He is not a man who has attempted to court Lydia Martin, for a good ten years, for nothing. Life has taught him something about persistence. Maybe that quite often it gets you fuck all in the way of results, but even so.

"Yeah," he nods, taking a hungry bite out of his baclava, saliva rushing at the sticky honey-sweetness, the tooth-rotting caries guarantee of it. He catches her look glancing down his torso, and winces. It's pretty clearly not at all a _hello hotness_ look, but rather a _what the fuck have you spilled down yourself and are you a homeless dude, dude?_ look. It makes him itchy with embarrassment, and he rushes to explain. "Ah, yeah, good look, right? That's why I need a fix of your fine, fine, coffee, right? Because I already spilled the one I had down myself." He looks down at his good flannel shirt, his favourite, his beloved, and sighs. "Not just myself, either. I spilled the other half of it down a movie star."

The snort across the counter alerts him to the idea that maybe this heavyset damsel of the confectionery gods, thinks he's spinning her fairy stories in the hope of impressing her. (He has a feeling he'd have to go a lot further than telling tall tales about hanging out with celebrities, in order to impress Yolanda.)

It deflates him a little bit, not that it'd take much after the day he's had so far. Nettles him enough to have him backing up his story with further detail, too. Yolanda's just the latest in a long line of females who've found themselves not suckers for the old Stiliinski charms: but he'll show her! He is a man on the town! He has glamour, connections, and friends in photo-lens-worthy high places!

"It's true," he argues, leaning on the counter and settling in for the duration. "Hey, I work for a movie-star! And that's true, you know the book-shop two rows down? It's – "

That earns him the most vigorously withering eye-roll he's ever encountered from a female – and he's had the full-strength Lydia Martin- patented brush-off before now, so he knows that of which he speaks. "Oh, shut up. I know about the Thacker book-shop, teach yer Nanna to suck eggs, why don't you?" (Stiles is pretty proud of his mastery of English idiom by this point. Even if the English don't always understand what he's talking about. Or he, them.) "Everybody round here knows about the Thackers. But Anna Scott doesn't _own_ it. She only married the bloke, right?" Yolanda is getting drawn in despite her best efforts, Stiles can see it too. Moving in closer, straightening and rearranging the fancy cakes on the counter-stand as an excuse to linger and loiter, her meaty fore-arms flexing as she folds them.

She could take him in those mighty hands and break him, and he almost chokes on a crumb of baclava at the thought. But not enough to shut him up, or silence his protests. "Hey, it makes no difference," he asserts, and he might still be chewing but he's got a point to make. "I hang out with movie stars, that's an undisputed fact, right? I think you'll find you've just conceded it. And if I'm hanging out with Anna Scott, why wouldn't – "

Here he pauses, because Goddamn, this is big news. He gives her a sly grin, her face still slabbily sceptical and unimpressed. Maybe amused. If Lydia put on forty extra pounds, was of Greek extraction and wore a pink overall and a hairnet, then maybe...

"Why what?" she prompts him. The doorbell dings, and a couple of middle-aged women come in, fatly tired and bearing shopping bags, and start assessing the olives and eyeing up the hams. She takes fuck-all notice of them. 'Cause he's reeled her in, right? Stiles Stilinski, master storyteller: his future screenwriting Oscar awaits.

Ooh, Stiles swaggers a bit as he leans showily on the counter (and she whips the cake stand swiftly away from all contamination.) And he flings a hand out into the air, punctuation as he announces, "Oh, I dunno, why wouldn't Derek Hale be hanging out with us there at the same time, huh? Yeah, you heard right! Derek Hale!"

She gets the thousand watt benefit of his perkiest grin, but she's still looking unimpressed, and probably frankly disbelieving. And he sags a bit at a sudden thought, and the counter's a bit slippy with some synthetic cream, and his elbow slides right off it so that he totters. Frankly, he probably looks a bit of a fool. "Except he's the one I spilt my coffee down." And he gestures at the damp wreck of his t-shirt. "I don't think I made the greatest first impression ever."

"Really?" Apparently a tale of disaster and woe makes a movie-star anecdote that much more believable.

Stiles sags further, and droops his head down to the counter. The middle-aged women are tapping on the other end of it, and giving Yolanda considerable bitch-face. She pretty clearly doesn't give a fuck. "Yeah. As opening gambits go, I don't think he thought much of my courtship rituals." He thinks back to Hale's face, as he looked down at the offending splatters on his bespoke Savile Row tailoring. Disinterest? Disdain? Demented fury? Some other d-word? The only D he'll be getting near, when it comes to Derek Hale, in any case. Clearly.

The other customers have edged closer, and are crowding him out at the end of the counter. "You want to sell anything today, love?" one enquires tartly of Yolanda. They're both getting bitch-face at this point, and Stiles sighs and picks up his coffee, holds on tighter to the remains of his candy. It's all he's got to comfort him, right now. "Anyway, better go. See if I've still got a job, or if they're letting me go, for hurling boiling beverages at famous customers. Catcha next time I need a sugar fix."

"Yeah, laters," Yolanda agrees. And he turns back as he opens the door, when she calls out after him. "You know, Tom Hiddlestone comes in here sometimes, when he's filming local. If you've struck out with Hale you might as well hang around here now and then, see if you can pick up another film star. You know, if that's your thing." And she snickers at him, and he gives her a smirk and a very polite finger – only the Brits can do that, but he's learning – as he steps backwards down the two stone steps at the deli entrance.

So that's one step back, two, three – No. It should be three. But it actually goes one step, two, er, oops, what, bash. Because there's something, or someone, in the way, as he goes for step number three, and it protests strongly as he stumbles around it, tries to turn around while being frustrated in that final step onto the pavement, and – oh, how neat, the parabola described through the air, a beautiful arc indeed! - tips his coffee all over whoever it is who's been inconsiderate enough to get in his damned way.

Oh, Christ, Stiles could actually literally cry, as he turns – second time today? Second time today! And that's even before his eyes fall on the poor unfortunate who's the unwilling, unwitting recipient of his generosity.

Well. Heavily lacquered, sharply cut black hair. Heavy on the stubble. Symmetrically handsome to an almost ludicrous degree. Eyes that sparkle as if they were poured full of glitter, all colours, a kaleidoscope of surreal landscapes.

It's just not Stiles' day, and he accepts that, now. As well as his doom, probably. It's Hale, Derek Hale. Again. And he doesn't look nearly as tolerant of the village idiot that is Stiles, as he did the first time he got a caffeinated deluge off of him.

It's also actually much more of a deluge, than the few spattering drops that he'd got away with last time, taking the worst of the downpour himself. It's all over Hale's suit jacket. It's on his crisp white shirt, which isn't so very crisp any more. Nor so very white, either. Stiles feels pretty lucky that he didn't just go the whole hog and scald the guy all over his preternaturally handsome face. That would have been a mind-boggling insurance claim, for sure. That would have dwarfed the standard movie-star ridiculous insurance policies, for their asses and hair and toes and who knows what. That would have run into the millions.

And Stiles is vaguely aware that he's actually babbling these ridiculous thoughts out, as he whips out some clean tissues from his hoodie pocket and – Christ, is he actually losing his mind? - tries to dab at some of the damage he's done, tries to minimise the disaster. But he doesn't get the chance, of course: instead, Hale grabs the tissues off him, and very slowly begins to wipe at his own garments, his own face. (Oh Christ again, so Stiles didn't quite manage to entirely miss the target there. Oh hell and...)

And he glares at Stiles as he does it, while Stiles' babble winds down into an open-mouthed silence. They're staring at each other. Oh God, he has tried to scald Derek Hale's beautiful face and destroy a million dollar movie studio property. And now he is trying to stare Derek Hale out. Stiles has lost his mind.

He jerks his head back and away, wildly, and he scans through the ridiculous nature of what he's just been blurting out. He thinks he's probably safe – safe from total humiliation, in any case. He doesn't think he mentioned the 'preternaturally handsome' bit. And as he re-opens his mouth for a fulsome – and hopefully more considered – apology, Hale gets in ahead of him. "Have you got some vendetta going?" he snaps out, giving Stiles a mean glare out of the corner of one eye, and flicking a glance down the street, then, fast, probably to check for paparazzi, or public peeps with their smartphones out. But the street is unusually deserted, and he's probably safe for the minute. "I mean," he adds, hopelessly fingering at the – yep, sodden, Stiles has drenched him all right – fabric of his shirt, "once was okay. Well, no, not okay. But I didn't feel like you were _targeting_ me, or trying to put me in the local burns unit or something. Did Anna put you up to this?" He looks half-serious as he stares at Stiles. Stiles has heard things about Anna's on-set rep as a prankster, so it's not completely surprising.

He's not surprised. He's just horrified, that's all. Stiles slaps his hands over his face, and moans. "Oh, God, no, of course not. And please, please, I am so godforsaken sorry I could just roll over and die right now. Look." Stiles sucks in a great big deep breath, and tries to be calm, and tries not to hyperventilate. He tries to not even think about hyperventilating. One peep at Hale's shirt – and, just as a by-product and accidental bonus, at his beautiful and manly chest, which is heaving with irritation, Stiles thinks – tells him that the damage is just as bad as he thought, uh oh. "Look," he repeats. "I live really close – it's only one street away. It's Will's old house, actually – they let it me for a peppercorn rent, in exchange for me opening up and locking up and generally being on call for alarms going off and all that jazz."

"Nice for you. If you'll excuse me now. Unless you have any other hot beverages you feel like hurling at me," Hale says stonily. And he turns away, looks up the street and is clearly ready to find some better, Stiles-free place.

"No!" Stiles yelps, and makes to grab at his shoulder, then mercifully pulls back, before actually laying hands on Derek Hale. Instead he dances down the steps ahead of him, and can feel the pleading expression on his face. "What I mean is, it's handy, if you want – you could have a quick wash and brush up, I, uh, actually there are some of Will's old suits in a wardrobe, you could borrow – "

He is, officially, a blithering idiot. Maybe it's this country that's doing it to him. Maybe he's turning into Bertie Wooster or sum'thin'. He flings his hands out wide in supplication, looks from side to side, and he doesn't even know what he's expressing beyond helplessness, what to say.

But it must be enough to make Hale take pity on him, so yay to that. "All right," Hale says. He looks reluctant, and a little constipated, and suspicious. But even so... Stile wonders if he heard right.

"Really, man?" he queries. Because, hell, did Derek Hale just agree to come home with him? (Not like that, maybe. But even so.)

"Don't make me regret it. More than I do already," Hale says grumpily, and pushes past him roughly enough to jog at Stiles' shoulder. So what Stiles does, Stiles stands and gawps after him for a moment, on the bottom step, and then inside the deli glass door, something catches his eye.

The 'something', that's Yolanda. Who is grinning from ear to ear of her round shiny face, and giving him a double thumbs up. Her eyes are wide and stunned enough to tell him that, up until this moment, she didn't believe word one of his Derek Hale shaggy dog story. But now she does. Now she does, all right.

He falls off the step, while grinning and giving her a thumbs-up and a victory hands-aloft into the bargain. But no harm done, only a scratch or two, and Hale looking impatiently back for him like he's touched in the head. Which Stiles definitely isn't. Maybe a touch dazzled and glamoured, at most.

"So," Stiles says, falling into step beside him, and stealing a quick sideways glance. Man, glowering and irritable is a good look on Derek Hale. Although, to be fair, there are probably a very small number of looks that aren't. "Werewolf film with Anna, huh?" Because he is riveted. Because this, this, he has to get the skinny on. Maybe before anyone else in the whole wide world. Or at least, before anyone on the internets.

Hale doesn't seem all that impressed by his conversational gambit. With another sideways look, he mutters, "Looks like it." He also looks like a man who's contemplating the prospect of having his teeth pulled out with pliers, sans anaesthetic. Which, what?

"Jeez, man," Stiles says, dancing around in front of him and walking backwards, and only marginally failing to avoid a couple of chavvy kids, who hoot and hurl abuse at him as they continue their little-ruffian way for the next two minutes. "How you suffer, huh? I mean, I'm not saying that Anna isn't a demon from hell, when she's experiencing her own lunar cycle and hasn't had her morning coffee, but strictly on the aesthetic front? That's a dish, man. She is a dish. You have to admit it, come on. I mean, maybe you're buddy-buddy with old William, in which case I understand that you might prefer to maintain a stoic and manly silence on the subject. But just between you and me, dude – come on. Anyone would, right? If she crooked her little pinkie at me, and summoned me to her bedchamber – I mean," Stiles adds, "after ordering to have me bathed and perfumed – and deloused, of course – then? Well," he considers. "I'd be too frightened to even think about saying no, right? You get me?"

From the roll of Hale's eyes, Stiles isn't sure exactly what he gets. But all he gets out of him is, "I'm not going to start discussing the aesthetic merits of my co-stars with you, _Genim_."

"What!" Stiles is, let's be honest, a little freaked. And maybe a little excited. Derek Hale knows his name! His real name! (His awful real name, or the anglicized version – the one that all his friends, family, co-workers, cohort, and the rest of the planet are forbidden ever to use, when referring to or addressing him. But even so.) "Where did you even get a hold of my name? Wh – What? How? Are you, like, stalking me?" The idea is novel, and not unpleasant. He makes cut-the-crap moves with his hands in the air, demanding the truth. (And still walking backwards, leading the way to his humble little North London home. The fact that he barely misses a lamp-post as he walks, pales in significance compared to the fact that Derek Hale knows his name. And has hung out at his place of work. And, shortly after, turned up outside the deli of which Stiles is a frequent patron, as anyone at the Thacker bookshop could have told Hale.)

" _Are_ you stalking me?" he asks, wide-eyed at the notion. It's a lot less accusing, than it is frankly thrilled. Hale looks less pissed than amused, for the first time: but all he does is to snort faintly, and make a ts-ts-ts-ts sound with his sweet sweet bunny-teeth. Stiles takes that to mean, 'as if!' They keep on walking: it's an enchanted stroll, by now, for Stiles. He hops into place, walking in stride and right-way-round with Hale, and continues his harangue, arms a-gesticulating.

"Come on, man, don't deny it," he says, and the grin on his face is close to splitting it in half. "You copped a load of this," and here he indicates his own wiry and lanky form, "in the shop, and then you turn up on the deli doorstep just as I'm scarfing down Greek candy?"

Hale stops, and looks at him. From amused, he's gone to unreadable: eyes hooded, mouth pensive. "Yes," he says.


	3. In which Stiles is kissed by a celebrity.  But which one?

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> After you douse a filmstar in coffee, the least you can do is offer them a shower, and think lecherous thoughts, right? That's what Stiles thinks.

It's definitely not the answer that Stiles was expecting. They're about fifty yards away from his loaned front door, and he abruptly loses the power of locomotion, stumbles over his own feet and has to be rescued from falling into a trash can by Hale grabbing his arm. He gets a very patient, roll-eyed look for that: like Hale is wondering if he needs a keeper, or a straitjacket. But once he's back on his feet, he recovers the power of speech, too. “Ah, yes? As in, yes, you're stalking me?” Stiles boggles, visibly, just like anyone would. He should probably be freaked. And appalled.

But hey. Not _everybody_ gets stalked, every day, by the hottest movie star on the planet.

He's inclined to preen a little bit. Put his hand to his hair and flounce, just slightly. Maybe he actually does. There may be a coy giggle involved.

Hale gives him maybe the driest look he's ever encountered without the assistance of hygroscopic chemicals, and keeps walking: Stiles stumbles to keep up. “Yes, I turned up on the deli doorstep. To pick up something to eat, before I called my driver,” he says, slowly, like he's actually talking to an idiot. (Well...)

His lips twitch, kind of like Stiles is amusing, like a puppy that can't stop falling over its own feet. Like he's thinking about keeping him, adopting him, which Stiles would totally be down with. “Are you sure the prospect is that attractive?” he asks. “I have a few stalkers myself. More than a few, actually. The kind my agent keeps files on, that she shares with law enforcement on a regular basis. It's not all it's cracked up to be.”

They're at Stiles' front door, and Hale kind of looms at him, expecting an answer. Stiles is getting his key out, and trying not to flail while doing it, and failing. The general excitement of the day so far is gonna kill him. He's basically inviting Derek Hale over his threshold. There ought to be a blast of trumpets or something. “Yeah,” Stiles says, nerves making his hands shake almost too much to get the key in the lock, “but I'll bet your stalkers aren't film-stars.”

“No, not most of them,” Hale agrees, leaning against the brickwork while he waits for Stiles to get his shit together and actually let them in. Stiles gets the key in the lock. He gets the door open. _Hallelujah_.

And Stiles throws an arm wide before him, in invitation and indication of the open hallway of William Thacker's rickety little old terrace house. Which he also keeps on, out of the most raging sentimentality. “Ah, mi casa es su casa, man,” he assures the film-star he's brought home. (Who he is, assuredly, not going to kill, cook and eat. Though judging by Hale's dubious expression as he peers into the dim hallway, he's not entirely sure about that.)

But he does step inside. “You know” Stiles says, bringing up the rear, “this little house has now hosted two movie stars, man. _Two_. You and Anna. London Borough Council is going to have to put up a blue plaque pretty soon.”

Derek just snorts: and turns around at the entrance to the kitchen. There's a disgusted look on his face, as he fingers at his soaked shirt and jacket, and the message is clear. “Ah, bathroom up on the left, dude,” Stiles says hastily. “There's all kindsa stuff up there, shampoo and razors and soaps and weird bath gels and powders Anna leaves behind whenever she has a dirty weekend here with old William. Which I totally prefer not to think about, but every so often Will buys me and Greenberg a weekend ticket to LegoLand and tells us to fuck off for the weekend, because they're having a sentimental break in his old stamping ground. What am I supposed to think? You agree?”

Hale's blankly aggravated look clearly says _do I care?_ More clearly than any amount of words ever could. So Stiles gets the fuck out of the way, and Hale says, “Thank you,” on a heavy, impatient exhale, and heads up the stairs.

Stiles has a worrying thought as he goes, though. “Hey, anything else you find up there, man?” he calls. “I mean, any... prophylactic products. Or lube. Or... things from Anne Summers. That's my room-mate! Greenberg is a pervert! Don't be thinking any of that stuff is mine!” Oh shit. Well, Stiles mentally concedes. Not _most_ of it, anyway. “But anything you want, or whatever you want to do... Get washed up, or shower, or shave, or bathe... help yourself... To anything.” He thinks about that, As Hale turns at the top of the stairs and looks down at him impassively. “I mean, not the sex toys. Unless you want, of course.”

And as Hale gives him an incredulous look, and turns into the bathroom, banging the door shut, Stiles has an endless, endless moment, to relive the mortification of what he can't believe that he's just said. It goes on a lot longer than a moment, though. It goes on for the entire, whole time that Hale is upstairs in his bathroom, doing whatever it is that he's doing. Having a shower, is what it sounds like. Not that Stiles stands at the bottom of the staircase, listening out. No, he just happens to be there – loitering a bit, hanging out – when it occurs to him to yell up, “You'll need new clothes, man! Won't you, right? I think we're about the same size – well, barring about twenty pounds of muscle. I'll pick something smart out and leave it hanging on the bannister, okay? Okay?”

He has no clue if Hale has heard him or not, there's no indication. The shower is going full blast, and there's going to be enough condensation to leave the place full of mould until he gets to it with bleach, and the hydrogen peroxide spray. British fucking plumbing, man. He's acclimated himself to most things. But.

But he creeps up to his own bedroom, picks out his smartest suit jacket and best shirt – well, his only decent jacket and shirt, to be honest. He doesn't go to many weddings. One wedding, no funerals, since he hit England, and that was Will's sister Poppy's renewal of vows to her crazy Welshman spouse, not first-timers. Then he checks out Will's old wardrobe, in Greenberg's room – manfully averting his eyes from beads of a rectal nature, cold pizza, and G's collection of trainspotting documentation – and takes out the couple of old suits Thacker left behind when he hit the jackpot, and left with his Hollywood honey for a life of Italian villas, and lunch with Madonna at China Tang.

He dumps them over the bannister, just like he said, and stops for a moment, staring wistfully at the closed bathroom door, listening to the downpour within. He is absolutely _not_ visualizing Derek Hale, wet and completely butt-naked in his shower.

Much.

But that's only because he's thinking mostly about his own faux-pas about the sex toys. And fuck, it isn't as if he was even entirely joking. God knows where Greenberg gets some of his – tools – but they are not items you can purchase from a respectable High Street sex shop. The little perv.

It's better not to think about it. And better not to hover about, because if Hale were to burst out of the bathroom on a sudden, to yell down the stairs about some item of toiletries he's urgently in need of, then Stiles would undoubtedly look like the biggest creeper who has ever creeped as an Olympic event. He might as well be mouth-breathing, and gently stroking the placket of his pants while gazing earnestly.

So he gets the hell downstairs, and attempts to pretend to himself that he's concentrating on making coffee, and slumping in front of Big Bang Theory on E4. It occurs to him that he hasn't let Martin or Boyd or, hell, anyone, know where the hell he's got to. But fuck it. Thacker's is possibly, probably, the most eccentric place of employment that's ever had the pleasure of counting him on the payroll, and it's practically lunch-time anyway. If he lets them know what's going on now, Anna or Martin or someone – Christ, possibly _Rufus_ , if he turns up, and that's not an outcome anyone wants – might decide to stroll over. And interrupt what little alone time he might be able to wangle with the hottie of Beacon Hills, the prospective cinematic werewolf of West Kensington.

He's so excited he couldn't possibly fall asleep. Except maybe all the caffeine has an atypical effect – or the excitement is just too traumatic, and his brain decides to switch off, short out. The next thing he knows, someone's saying his name, and he's stirring back to life. “Stiles. Stiles. _Genim_. Stiles!”

He startles awake with that red-and-sore round the eyes feeling of unscheduled daytime sleeping, neck stiff from the couch. It's Derek Hale. Standing over him, and looking down at him, fresh and newly showered and wearing Stiles' clothes, only a little bit on the tight side for him.

It seems like a dream. Inviting Derek Hale home with him, wasn't that a dream? He stares up a moment. “Thanks for the shower,” Hale says, impenetrably poised. “And the loan. I'll get these laundered and have them sent back to you. I'm just going to call my driver, and then I'll be out of here.”

Well, as far as Stiles is concerned, that constitutes an emergency. It galvanizes him into springing up with a lot more grace than speed, and standing up just that little bit too close to his guest. They're eye to eye, and he flinches a little bit, uncomfortable. “Oh, hey, you don't need to just rush off like that, right?” he offers. “You said you were at the deli for something to eat? I'll make you something, man, what you want to eat? I've got, uh, there's definitely some cold take-out in the fridge, I could heat that up, or we absolutely have soba noodles, and there's pickles of some kind – English pickles, we don't eat 'em, we just take 'em out and sniff and stare at 'em now and then...” He pauses, because it's hopeless. Derek Hale eats at, like, the Ivy, when he's in town. He probably doesn't even need a booking, just turns up, and they turf out all the bankers and minor royals. He probably has Heston Blumenthal and Nigella Lawson to his London apartment to cater, when he has a dinner party. He isn't going to sit on Stiles' couch and eat re-heated take-out.

Derek wrinkles his nose, not like he's appalled but kind of making fun. Not in a mean way, Stiles doesn't think. “What, no apricots in honey?”

And they both laugh, and that's practically as good as if he'd stayed. “God, what is that about?” Stiles expostulates. “What is with the _apricots in honey_ gag?”

Derek laughs some more, and looks so relaxed you'd hardly know him for the guy who plays cops and space-cops and criminals and monsters, all of whom regularly beat the crap out of everyone they encounter, and shove them into every flat surface going. “Yeah, I know. Anna never has explained it to me. Will just taps his nose if I ask, and winks.”

“What?” Stiles asks. “With his hair flapping around?”

Yeah, it's funny, it's a real nice moment. But Hale leaves anyway – gathers up his sodden clothes in a bag Stiles hastily locates, thanks him nicely for the use of the facilities, and is at the front door in the hallway before Stiles can get in one more apology. “So sorry again about your suit and tie, dude,” he insists on saying, as Hale opens the door. “I mean, I will totally pay for the dry-cleaning, if you want to let Anna know what it costs, and...”

As expected, Hale just waves it off, not even looking at him, just out at the street. It's a fairly transparent attempt at further contact, anyway. “Forget it. Christ, my car's not here yet.”

“You've been really great about this, though,” Stile insists. “I guess it's the old school tie, one old BHHS alumnus to another? Otherwise, got to say I'd be expecting you to, you know, shove me up against a wall. Or my face into a steering wheel. Just based on your public persona, man.” Yeah, that's the one based on his film roles, and on some real-life incidents, too. But he sure seems a nice guy, comparatively, today. Most of the time.

He looks back at Stiles, now. “Beacon Hills? Yeah, Anna mentioned. I remember your Dad. The Sheriff, right?” Then he smiles, slightly. “You sound kind of disappointed about not getting menaced. Roughed up.”

Stiles shrugs, his heart's going a little fast. “Souvenir, man! When you meet a celebrity, it's the thing to get something to remember them by. I could tell everyone I'd been...”

But Stiles doesn't continue, lets it trail off. Because he's a little busy, being _menaced_. Hale's expression is suddenly tightly cold, the way he schools it for his most badass roles. It's like he's planning to kill Stiles, eat a few bites and dispose of the rest of the body. And he's up close, real close, and that's Stile's wrist being held up against the wall, a little tight, a little painful. He's up so close, with those unidentifiably-hued eyes grimly glaring into Stiles' own, that Stiles has to close his eyes, run away inside his own head.

“What the hell are you going to tell them?” Hale hisses, right in his face. And Christ, the moment strings and spins itself out for an eternity, right there. 

Then there's just the faintest huff of a laugh, in Stiles' face. And... the lightest kiss, no more than the barely-felt brush of tender skin against skin, where it's most delicate.

_Fuck_. Derek Hale _kissed_ him. Stiles can't think, at all, he thinks confusedly. But if he _could_ think, he'd be thinking that this is the moment he should be fizzing with crushy excitement, springing an embarrassing woody, trying to cop a feel, blushing and garrulous and hyperventilating a little bit.

But there's none of that. There's just time, stopped, yawning out between them, with their faces close together. He opens his eyes, feeling his breathing actually slow down, soft and deep, and they look right into each other's eyes, up so close they could breathe each other's air. Hale looks puzzled, yeah, puzzled. Like something's not gone to plan.

Then he shakes himself a little, and shoves Stiles into the wall. Not hard: just enough so that yeah, Stiles can tell his buddies that hey, he got _menaced and shoved into a wall_ by Derek Hale, how cool is that? Kissed, and menaced, he thinks. But he might not add that. 

“Be glad I don't drag your ass into the station and throw you into the drunk-tank!” Hale drawls, from some film or other that might or might not be one of his own. (Yeah, Stiles is a film-buff. But Hale was in some pretty terrible films, to be honest, early on.) 

They both laugh, and Stiles can mostly keep up intermittent eye contact, as Hale turns back to the doorway. And yeah, that's his driver drawing up, in a big fuck-off Bentley, that must be like sailing the Queen Mary around narrow London streets.

Hale smacks his arm, in farewell. “That's me. Raincheck on the noodles, Genim. And the apricots.” And he's gone, down the steps, climbing into the back of the car, _gone gone gone_.

Stiles watches until it's out of sight, then he climbs up the stairs to his room, and lies on his bed, jerks off. While he thinks about the beautiful film-star, who just flirted with him and kissed him.

No, no, he doesn't. If he had any manly pride and self-respect, that's what he'd do, that's what anyone would do. It would be an entirely normal and reasonable response. But what he really does is stare into space, with some lame romantic French chanteuse on his iPod, the one who was married to the French President. He stares into space, and he can see the little motes of dust in the sunlight of his room, and he can feel the kiss like he may never stop feeling it.

Then he picks himself up, after twenty minutes or so, and goes back into work. Because even the Thacker Travel Bookshop staff have their limits, and their standards.


	4. In which Stiles gets interrogated by Lydia and volunteered to babysit for demons.  Not literal demons, right?

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Oh, Stiles gets kissed by film-stars _all the time._ No big deal, right?
> 
> He might never recover. Nor will Lydia, when she finds out.
> 
> And what the hell has Anna been up to, regarding Derek Hale?

Anna doesn't show, and William doesn't show up at the shop either, not for the rest of the week. Stiles does hear stuff about the prospective werewolf film, because there are rumours and hints online. Anna and Hale are definitely in discussions with Ridley Scott and a bunch of backers including Film4, apparently. It may be a _go_. 

He doesn't tell anyone about the kiss, not one fucker, because he knows full well he would be a) disbelieved and b) mercilessly mocked, even by anyone who deigned to believe him. If he could he'd just forget about it, because it disturbed his peace at the time, and it only seems to be disturbing his peace more, as time goes on. There are ads for Hale's current film everywhere he looks, on buses and sidings and hoardings and televised soccer matches, trailers on TV and the net. He plays an ex-con who's gone straight as a security advisor, but gets drawn into a kidnap plot by his ex-girlfriend through her blackmail. Stile knows that the actress who plays the girlfriend, Kate Argent, is actually an old girlfriend of Hale's in real life, though they've been broken up a while now. They don't look all that comfortable in the publicity jaunts, although they fake it well. Or Hale, at least, looks uncomfortable. Argent has enough _savoir faire_ and poise to stock a Swiss finishing school for a decade. She's a fair amount older than Hale, and it was more significant when they got together, when he was what, eighteen, nineteen? Lots of rumours and gossip: but that's the Hollywood double standard for you. 

Argent's never quite made it into the top tier of Hollywood actresses, despite her acting talent and her beauty. And also despite her contacts: Chris Argent is a near-top flight director, and his wife has produced some major films. Gerard Argent, the _paterfamilias_ , was a mean-natured, undeniably gifted 'maverick' – if anyone is really a maverick – of the business, back before he went crazy and joined a freako cult of woo-woo believers in monsters and aliens and unusual gods, back in the sixties. 

You can feel a trace of resentment, of the fact, underneath Kate's big dazzling smiles and her magnetic personality, her wild laugh and exuberance. This role has to be a big deal for her: maybe her last chance, for a memorable career, for a kind of immortality. She's on the edge: the edge of beginning to get offered roles as someone's mom. She doesn't strike Stiles as the kind of person who's going to see that as a potentially fruitful, artistically interesting career development. More of an insult.

So he can't help it, thinking about Hale a lot, more than he should. The guy gets brought to mind, all the time. But Stiles carries on doing his best, putting his hours in at the shop, trying to focus on his studies and his writing, skyping Dad and Scott and Lydia, back home. Lydia is probably a mistake. It's not that he intends to tell her a thing. It's not that it even slips out. It's just that Lydia is a telepathic creepfest unique unto herself, and she always knows when he's withholding. Back in the day, the long-gone glorious days of his hopeless pining, she knew full well that he fell asleep with her name on his lips, and sent her three, not just the one, Valentine's cards. (One for the poem, one with the candy, and one with the sad-eyed teddy bear. Of course.)

Now that they're good buddies, having survived sororities and frats and living out and moving schools (five between them) and sharing digs at MIT and graduating, travelling to hang out on weekends and negotiating post-grad studies, it's worse. Now it's his affections and hormonal fixations and hopeless crushes on other people that she unerringly sniffs out. And he doesn't know how, because he's upbeat, and he tells her about Anna visiting, and he tries to throw her off the track by getting her to discuss Jackson's latest asshole-ism.

“Who is it?” she asks, suddenly halting her discourse on her progress to tenure and how her current prof/boyfriend is hot but dim, to look at him. Then to point at him, little mini-Lyds and her truncated tablet-bound form. “What's going on? Stilinski, you're keeping something from me. A matter of the heart. Or the other parts. You know how I feel about that. As your personal advisor and agony aunt.”

So that leaves Stiles with two choices, and he contemplates them, tilting his chair back and inviting death by fractured skull. It might beat out getting the third degree from Lydia. So, he can front it out, deny everything, make like he's fine. Then break, and spill the beans, because that's what happens when Lydia submits you to the full majesty of those regally unimpressed baby-blues.

Or he can just spill right now, so he goes for that. Saves time all round, right? “I met Derek Hale,” he allows, and rolls his eyes and totters on two chair legs a bit, as Lydia narrows her eyes and leans in. “In the shop.”

Lydia's face is fierce. “Right, _lifestyles of the rich and famous,_ yep, Stilinski? Why don't you just taunt me with it, why _don't_ you? Since I'm not actually there to smack you for it.” (Lydia has never stopped fuming and fretting, since Stiles lucked into the Thacker Bookshop gig, and its attendant proximity to celebrity and glamour. Not that she has any thespian-type or modelling ambitions, or not on a professional basis – she's hardly going to have time, what with that Fields medal still to be attained. But even so: it's a law of nature that any glamour and starry altitude to be had in the immediate vicinity, belongs by all rights and natural law, to Lydia Martin). 

Then her face relaxes, disapproval and jealousy vented. “So, our local Beacon Hills boy made good in Hollywood, huh? Well, when he wasn't busy being home-schooled or on location shooting for the vampire show and all of that. Did he spend more than a year actually at school? I know he was on the lacrosse team at one point...”

She's getting distracted. And Stiles doesn't actually want to talk about this, so that's fine by him. “Yeah, I think the whole school went into mourning when the third series of the show got the green light after all, and he disappeared again. Beacon Hill's loss, the entertainment industry's gain, I guess. Down one co-captain of the team, up one growly scowly teen vampire.”

He's too casual, and she's alerted. “So you met him? And what does that _mean_ , exactly?”

“Does it have to mean anything?” Stiles hedges. Maybe he can head her off at the pass. Maybe he can sell her London Bridge.

“Yeah, it means something,” Lydia decides, tossing a hundredweight of soft copper waves back like My Little Ginger Pony. “It means something that you're _pining_. Don't tell me you're not pining, Stiles,” she dismisses, waving a hand at the screen. “I can smell pining right across an ocean. It's all over you. Spill. What happened?”

What does it matter, anyway? He might at least get a little sympathy out of the humiliation. “He kissed me,” Stiles says, and for once he doesn't feel the need to elaborate, not at all. Lydia will make quite enough, out of that bare fact.

“Kissed you! No! He didn't! Did he? He kissed you? Oh, my God, you're dating a film-star! My best friend is dating Derek Hale! Okay, I'm cutting you off, I have to tell everybody, I'll talk to you later...”

Jesus. And Stiles thought Lydia was unflappable. Was terminally incapable of flapping, temperamentally unsuited to it. This is undoubtedly the closest he's ever witnessed her to experiencing genuine enthusiasm and excitement, instead of a cool _hauteur_ so frigid it approaches complete torpor. He abandons, even, his usual platonically worshipful approach to her holy person. “For god's sake, Lydia,” he snaps, unable to help himself, volume way up. “I am not dating Derek Hale! As if!”

It takes a few repetitions, even, to get through. And when it does, Lydia seems to resent it, and blame him for the coming back down to earth, more than a bit. “Should have known it was too good to be true,” she grumbles, settling back down on the bed in front of the little screen an ocean away. “As if you were ever going to hook a Hale. Even given the clear and present opportunity, you had to go and throw it away, when there are those of us who would not waste such an opportunity, Stilinski! Why? Why?” Her little fists are raised gracefully to the heavens, as if she expects an actual answer. Or maybe a thunderclap of judgement upon him. Then she abandons the drama, calms down, peers in expectantly. “Okay, give. Unburden yourself. What actually happened?”

And that's how she gets the full story, scanty as it is, out of him. No detail is spared, his blushes are not sympathised with. And that's also how Lydia comes to be planning a trip to London, college semester be damned, to visit her UK-based buddy Allison Argent. Yeah, those Argents.

xxx

None of this noticeably lifts Stiles' mood, although he fakes his usual perky and irrepressible demeanour pretty well, the rest of the week. Because what else can you do? You can't be a downer for other people, right? He's pretty good at faking being fine, seeing as he's had plenty of practice. Since his mom died he's never been anything other than fine, fucking _fine_. He owed it to his Dad, then, and now it's just a habit.

But he feels... weird. He knows, quite well, that he should just let it go, tuck it away as his little celebrity story that he tells after three beers, the one no-one listens to, still less believes. It's conceivable he might see Hale again, in the flesh, given his employers. At a distance, in passing, and most probably barely acknowledged, unless he manages to bring him a coffee without spilling it. (If he fetches Hale one and _does_ spill it, at this point, he'll probably be acknowledged with a sock to the jaw, he thinks.) 

Most likely Hale would struggle to remember him, even now. He's not going to be brooding about a moment in a darkened hallway, with a random guy who can't hold a coffee-cup steady and can't shut the fuck up and can't hide his star-struck state. He's probably had a dozen interviews and six dates and innumerable casual lays since then.

For the umpteenth time, Stiles puts it out of his mind: the feel of being pressed up against peeling anaglypta, held tight so that his wrist was pinched. (And later bruised. He's pored over those bruises. He's traced the pattern of them on his wrist like a bracelet.) The feel of a mouth barely and brushingly catching and stuttering on his, lip – tooth – lip – nip, with his eyes closed, his attention captured, reality arrested for a moment. Then back to normal, and that had jarred still more.

Yeah, he puts it right out of his mind, and Anna decides to help him.

Well, she decides to attend a high-society function thrown by Lord and Lady Blah-Blah-Hee-Haw while she's hanging out on this little Wooster-theme-park island, anyway. (Look, Stiles doesn't know their names, he doesn't read Tatler, or date Made In Chelsea girls, they know not the wonder of a Stilinski man.) And she drags William along, and she decides she doesn't trust the Ritz childcare services, and volunteers Stiles for the job.

Rocking up at her suite on a cool London autumn evening, it's William who opens the door, claps him on the shoulder and gives him the kind of harassed grin that suggests Anna is a little bit stressed, and is doling out that stress in small portions to all around her until it's off her plate completely. “Ah, Stiles! Always a pleasure, old son, always a pleasure. Come on in and make yourself at home, as always,” William urges, waving him in, shooing him further on into the suite's reception room and the living area beyond. “The kids are in the media room, there's, oh, snacks and drinks and all the usual bollocks in there, order what you want from room service, you know the drill by know, old love, eh?”

Stiles isn't ready to have the twins launch themselves into his vicinity and assault his person and eardrums, though, not quite yet. Not before he's got down and got personal with his good buddy Will, no. Instead of heading straight for the indicated door, he takes a detour, swerves and walks in a circle around William, as William is walking him to his babysitting doom for the evening. He whistles. “Nice monkey-suit, man. Anna take you out and do the Pretty Woman thing with her plastic down Bond Street, right?” he asks.

It's not offensive. Or, it totally is. But fortunately, he and Will share a sense of humour, and the worst he's going to get is...

“Shut up, you cheeky young blighter,” “Will says, and gives him a quick, stinging flip about the head, his own hair a-flopping wildly, grinning so that those cutie eye-wrinkles half split his cheeks apart. “I'll have you know I paid for this very nice bit of tailoring out of my own damn pocket. Just signed a deal for my script and two sequels to follow: no guarantees but it looks like this one might actually get into production within eighteen months!”

It is, in fact, a very nice suit. But the suit, at this point, isn't really the issue. For the last five months, that Stiles has known him, and as far as Stiles knows, for the twelve years of marriage-to-the-stars before that, William has been struggling to get his sputtering writing career off the ground, with Anna's active encouragement. (Come on. You're a big Hollywood star: do you want to say your hubbie runs a bookshop, or that he's a screenwriter?) He's placed a few travel pieces in big magazines, true: he has a column for some tight-ass right-wing prestige Sunday newspaper. (That's noted for its misogyny and prescriptive attitudes to women, amounting to 'be in the wrong at all times'. Anna, however, is now mysteriously excepted from the rigours of this regime, and held up as a perpetual paragon of womanhood. Her past-history nudie shots, apparently, have officially ceased to exist.) He's written a jokey how-to manual for spare-part men married to highly successful ladies. It sold, pretty well, but reading it feels like rubbing on a sore wound, in spots.

And now he's a writer, a real writer, a screen-writer. Paid, pro, in the biz. Stiles leaps a little, punches the air, punches William on the arm, can hardly speak for excitement and jealousy. (Except Stiles can always speak.) “Man! Don't joke with me! For real?” William nods, and if he grins any more his eyes are going to disappear and his face will officially split in half. “Oh my God! I really officially want to be you when I grow up! Jesus, man! Is Anna excited? She's got to be psyched, right?”

And that's when the lady of the manor herself makes her appearance, of course – walking through from a door on the other side of the room, in a lemon yellow boat-neck knee-length dress and some very simple turquoise beads, her face almost creepily lovely and untampered-with. “Hey, space alien!” Stiles calls across to her. “When your people gonna come back for you in the spaceship, take you back now you've fulfilled your mission of making all the normal butt-ugly humans feel suicidally inferior?”

She comes over and hits him in the small of the back – just the spot that hurts the most, you don't mess with Anna, no – and pecks his cheek, grinning. “You pay a lovely compliment, Stiles. Weird. But nice. Have you heard what my honey's been up to?” And she transitions into Will's arms, where they exchange one of those chaste married-kisses that should be sexless enough not to be embarrassing, and are somehow more cringe-inducingly intimate than if they were heavy on the tongue and accompanied by a lot of grunting and grabbing. “My successful husband?”

William has his face turned into the soft sweep of her hair, warm and proud. “Hey, missed a bit there, my lovely. That's _sexy_ and successful, thank you, my love. Very Important. Don't think I'll be neglecting my arm-candy duties in future just because I'm doing a bit of scribblling on the side...” 

Oh, and they're kissing again. Stiles is kind of infatuated with the pair of them, and infatuated with them as a pair, but enough is enough. He backs off and heads for the kids' room, and he – cautiously – opens the door, and peers in. But no amount of caution is quite enough, not when faced with the threat of Stanley and Tomika. It's like alerting a herd of ten-ton meerkats, and though as his face slides in the door their eyes are fixed on Frozen on the big screen, the hotel nurse sitting bored, flipping a magazine in her lap... Three split-seconds later, they're on him, standing on his toes and biting his kneecaps.

He howls a little bit, but it's his own fault. Nobody expects the Spanish Inquisition, but anyone with experience of the Scott-Thacker kids expects conflagration, defeat and destruction at their hands. He's the one who agreed to a bit of over-paid danger-money for babysitting, after all. 

And Will and Anna don't do a damn thing to rescue him from the assault, as they come over, grinning, Will sliding his hands in his pockets, Anna smoothing his hair, still clearly warm and caught up in her pride. “Should be back about one a.m., old son,” Will advises him, saluting the hotel nurse as she slips thankfully out the suite door. “Let us know if there's any crisis. Or, you know, don't. I'm sure you can cope.”

Anna bends to kiss the demons, then back up to kiss Will's cheek. She's not even looking at Stiles when she says, “Precious darlings. Try not to break him. Stiles, hon, have you called Derek back yet? I'm not saying he's hanging around anxiously waiting for you to get back to him, but...”

Stiles is busy, trying to get one little Scott-Thacker demon under each arm. They're more controllable that way, head-locked and too busy trying to get free to bite. Hopefully. He barely registers. “What? What are you talking about, Anna? Tommy, if you promise not to take a chunk out of me I will let you eat all the pepperami. It's better quality protein anyhow, I have not been hitting the gym for a while.”

When his eyes swivel back up, Anna's leaning dreamily into indulgent _paterfamilias_ Will, who's silently mouthing urgings on to Stanley, who is aiming a kick at Stiles' rear portion. But she spares him another glance. “Derek, honey. Derek Hale. Have you returned his call? I gave him your number, that's okay, right?”

Tommy goes for the elbow. Stiles squeals. He can't deal with Anna's sense of humour right now. “Yeah, sure, I'll get to it. Anyway, Greenberg dropped my phone in the bath, while he was porny-tumblring his way through my contract minutes on my Android. The bast- the little assh – the _very bad man_.”

Anna laughs, 'cause he just made a funny, apparently. “Of course you did, Stiles. Will gave me the old 'treat 'em mean, keep 'em keen' too, initially. Didn't you, lover?”

And Tommy is crawling over his shoulder, with Stanley making a break for it and deciding to dump the plate of cookies in the shower and give 'em a drenching, as the Scott-Thackers do a final bit of nuzzling, laugh jovially at Stiles' predicaments, and nod as Stiles retrieves their demon-seed and waves 'em off for a glamorous night on the town.

The rest of evening is a Hammer Horror film of torture, sorrow and screeching. And a hell of a lot of Cheez-its and doritos. Three showings of Mary Poppins. It's only when the two little barbarians have finally exhausted themselves into sleep – being dungeon-masters is extremely hard work, apparently – that Stiles has leisure to remember a thing or two. And to wonder. About the phone thing, and about a call from Derek Hale.

“So tell me, kidlets,” he says, standing in their bedroom doorway, as they breathe heavily, pyjama'd and pink-cheeked and fatly sleeping. He says it quietly enough to be sure not to wake the gorgons. “Who was kidding? Me? No, Greenberg is a phone-stealing-and-destroying ass. And I should possibly not still be using Lydia's name as a password. But, the joking. Your mom? Or neither of us?” He looks down at his wrist. The bruises aren't quite gone. He still bears the marks. "Did Derek Hale call me?"


	5. In which Stiles receives a visitor, via an unconventional route

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> He came in through the bedroom window. It's nearly a Beatles tune.

Back in the living area, he thinks that he will ask Anna about it, when she and Will arrive back from their night of dissipation with the great and the good. But he's had a hectic evening, and the kids would wear anyone out. And the speculations he allows himself to entertain, lead on to pleasant and unlikely daydreams. The next thing he knows, the lights in the main room are dimmed, and Will is standing over him with a slightly dopey, slightly inebriated grin on his foppishly handsome face.

Stiles' dreams have been of Hale – very vivid dreams. So it's not difficult to bring his previous resolve immediately to mind. He stirs, trying to escape from sleep. “Anna?” he asks, not all that coherently. 

“Already in bed,” Will says cheerily. “She celebrated the glad tidings even more enthusiastically than I did. Possibly overdid it a bit. She'll be feeling it in the morning, poor love. How was _your_ evening?” He rocks on his heels, clearly puffed up still with well-being, and itching to share a bit of good will. “The kids?”

Stiles doesn't feel quite as benevolent. He has a crick in his neck from sleeping on the couch, and he's going to have to wait until the morning, at least, for the answer to an extremely burning question. “Your infants are agents of evil, Thacker,” he says sourly. “As you very well know.” Thacker's laughter follows him all th way out of the suite, right up to the external door, where he stops at a thought, and swivels around. “Will,” he says. “You wouldn't know if Anna was pulling my leg?” he asks “About the phone call? About Hale?” 

Will gives Stiles his most alertly intelligent look. “Stiles,” he says. “Little Stiles-y. I'm still not sure if Anna was pulling _my_ leg, about the whole _till death us do part_ thing. Twelve years on, and I still half expect her to turn around at any moment, and say “April Fool! You didn't _really_ think I was going to settle for a bookshop geezer, did you?”"

Useless. _Bloody_ useless, as William himself would have it. Stiles makes his disgruntled exit, with extra notes for cab fare stuffed in his back pocket by Thacker's wandering hands. (Sometimes he wonders about Thacker.)

When he gets back to the little house near the shop, he lets himself in, and stumbles around making cereal and searching in the fridge for milk. But fruitlessly, because Greenberg has used it all and not replenished their supply.

(Bastard.)

It's been a rough night, already. He kicks the refrigerator. “Consequences, G-man,” he mutters. “In the morning, there are gonna be _consequences_.” Then he remembers he has a soda, at least, upstairs in his room, that he took up the day before for a gaming sesh and didn't open. He clumps up there – no effort to be quiet, let the bastard be woken up and _dare_ complain – and starts poking about around his bed and computer, looking for it.

But he's distracted, that's all. Something's wrong, in his bedroom. Has Greenberg been looking for additional pornography supplies, again? Or is Greenberg just creeping and perving on _him_? (Stiles shudders.)

The window's open. “I did not leave that window open, when I left the house,” he mutters. “Did I?... Not sure.” He certainly didn't leave it that _far_ open, right? It's open wide. And it's raining, a bit. He goes over to investigate, but is distracted by a flash of yellow, where his laptop is propped beside the bed. 

There's a post-it on the case, stuck right in the middle. It's a little curled and crumpled, and Stiles smooths it out, to read it. 

**'I'M AT THE CONNAUGHT'** , it says, in what looks like fine-nibbed moss-green stylo-pen ink. **'NAME IS FRED FLINTSTONE. COME SEE ABOUT ME, GENIM. MORE COFFEE?'**

Underneath the block capitals is a London phone number. Underneath the phone number is a scrawl. Not much about it is decipherable, but it begins with a capital D, and somewhere in there is what's either an H or a scrawly P. Given the balance of probabilities – and even though those probabilities are fighting against a thousand unlikelihoods – Stiles thinks he knows which it is. Even though he pinches himself, hard. Has he morphed sideways, into an alternate universe, one where he's Samantha out of Bewitched, can make his wishes truth by wrinkling his adorable up-turned nose? (Well. He has the nose for it, anyway.)

Stiles' hands are trembling, a little bit. And not just because of the gale blowing through the open window. But he sucks down a great deep slow breath, steadies his nerves, wards off any risk of hyperventilation. He doesn't want to get started on _that_. And he goes over to shut the window.

There's a footprint on the broad sill. “Well, it is raining out, anyway,” he points out to himself, light-headed enough not to care who he's talking to. 

Derek Hale's character in the _Teen Vamp_ show that initially made his name, was kind of notorious for showing up unannounced and uninvited, and making himself at home in his love interest's bedroom unexpectedly. For his non-traditional methods of ingress into the homes of friends and enemies.

He generally came in through the bedroom window, yeah, that's right. 

It's one thing to do that as a supernatural fictional character on a show, though. Quite another as a flesh and blood regular – regular phenomenally famous – guy. Even one with a buttload of muscles, including regarding his phenomenal butt. 

Although... Stiles leans out the window, into the dark wet night, and looks out. They have a little back-garden, with a shed, a luxury in this area. And a built-on kitchen extension, that offers a roof and a route up quite close to the window, next to the drainpipe. Someone really determined, and fit, and athletic, and possibly suicidally inclined, could probably do it. Stiles himself would have to be hammered, absolutely, to even think of attempting it.

As he's looking out, there's a shadow that moves, out by their neighbour's garden wall. Stiles can't see a damn thing, not in the absence of light and the rain. He gets the impression of a figure, and a glance up at him, and then it's moving off.

“Derek?” he calls out. Not too loud, because what are the odds, really, and he feels an idiot already. 

There's a glance again, and in the orange street-lights he gets a flash of eyes that look almost red. Then whoever it is, is gone. 

_____

Yes, apparently, it seems that Fred Flintstone is a resident currently at the Connaught. (Who'da thought it? Stiles would have pegged Hale more as a Bam-Bam). And Stiles' hands tremble, when he finally works himself up to make the call, next afternoon.


	6. In which Stiles gains admittance to the Hale hotel suite under false pretences.  Naughty.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Stiles, a love-note, and Derek Hale's hotel suite. You can't call it stalking when you've got an invite, right?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Oops. I had Finstock turning up at two separate points in the space-time continuum. Imagine, two Finstocks! The multiverse would split apart under the strain!
> 
> And if anyone decides to write some Finstock-on-Finstock porny action, then you are one sick pup. Go on. Please.

(New phone. To which Greenberg has not yet contributed a penny, the tight asshole – ugh – but, even if Stiles has to start selling the contents of his room on highly specialised classified sites, then he's _going_ to.) The reception desk puts him through to the suite with nary a protest or raised eyebrow, and then he's talking to a minion who's either not too bright, or just mistrusts Stiles on instinct. Stiles asks for Mr Flintstone, and then Mr Hale, and then Fred, and then Derek. Identifies himself as Stiles, and Mr Stilinski, which both get blank silences. Zilch. And then _Genim_ , and that gets a relieved _ohhhh_ out of the minion.

This asshole, Hale. Stiles is beginning to have some doubts, here. 

But there's another voice on the other end of the connection, suddenly, and it's too late for that. “Hey, it's coffee dude! Coffee dude, right? You wanting to come round and give our boy another hot-beverage based shower? You know, there's other ways to get his clothes off, get a look at his junk, you see what I'm saying, right? You don't have to make him do the Romeo, Romeo thing at your bedroom window, either, you could just call back when – ”

Stiles is standing at his college refectory entrance, open-mouthed by the barrage of verbal assault and insinuation, when another voice takes over the line. From the muffled roars and squeals he also catches, there may be a bit of assault and battery involved in achieving that. “Sorry,” the new voice says. It's light and quiet and slightly breathless. Tough work, battery. 

It's Derek Hale. It's funny because Stiles planned all kinds of things to say, but now his mouth is dry. _You kissed me,_ is what he thinks, but obviously he's not enough of an idiot to say _that._ _You kissed this boy and he liked it, oh hell, want some more of that?_

After a moment he stumbles through the silence and regains his normal logohorreic state and condition. “Hey, it's you. I mean hi. You called me, and I didn't call you back.”

“I noticed,” Hale says. He does sound dry, but Stiles figures he's not actually mad. Well, he still left the post-it, right? 

“Because my house-mate destroyed my phone,” Stiles rushes to add. “He's a gibbering freak and shouldn't be allowed in close contact with technology. He's an ape, a real caveman. A genuine Flintstone. Why _Fred Flintstone_ , anyway?”

He can almost feel the shrug on the other end of the phone, and Hale's voice goes tinny and distant somehow. “My sister calls me Fred sometimes,” he says. “Called me Fred.”

Funny, right there. “Oh, God, yeah,” Stiles says, transported with pleasure at the celeb trivia recollection, proof of his terrifying stan status. “You're actually Frederick, right? From which Derek. And she calls you _Fred_ , hah, that's funny.” Then he thinks that maybe it wasn't such a great idea to actually _reveal_ his terrifying stan status, but it's way too late now. He rushes on in an attempt to obliterate it from memory. “Anyway, I got your message, dude,” he garbles, leaping in feet first, less smooth and graceful than he'd hoped. “I thought, maybe, ah, yeah. At least, I did until whoever you've got working for you started terrifying me with, um, suggestions and smut, you know? Who is that, is he on your payroll?” 

He has a feeling he's got distracted from the main thrust of his argument, to wit, that something resembling an actual date – or, fuck it, if this is an extremely convoluted booty call with a major celebrity he's barely laid eyes on before, and that's the way it goes down in Hollywood, then that is more than okay too - is supposed to be on the cards here, maybe. Not that it's good to come across as too eager, except he probably is. 

It's okay, though. He can hear the smile in the voice. “Yes, sorry about that. That's Isaac, he has a part in the film we're promoting. Wheels-man. He's a smart-ass, but kind of a friend too. I haven't killed him yet, at least.”

Isaac Lahey, Stiles thinks. Christ, he's mixing with the stars all right. “Escapee?” Stiles suggests. “Did he come onset with straitjacket in place?”

“He thinks I'm the crazy one,” Hale says. “I did break and enter into your house and leave you a love-note, after all.”

And Stiles is not going to read too much into that. That is definitely just kidding. Except his heart is bounding like it gained ten pounds in muscle, and is going in for a few reps. “Thanks for not reporting it to the cops,” Hale adds. “That would have been an interesting headline. Anyway. Coffee? I'll buy. If you promise to sit well away from me, and be very very careful about gesturing while you're talking.”

If Stiles is light-headed then he has some excuse. “Didn't even occur to me,” he says breathlessly. “I have nocturnal visitors all the time. Eh... Not vampires. Or via the window. I mean...”

“I'll take that as a yes,” Derek answers, and he doesn't actually laugh, but Stiles can hear in the little gasp, just how he's repressing it. Then there are voices in the background, and something clunking, and Derek is talking away from the speaker. He sounds exasperated.

Then he comes back. “God, I can't get a break,” he says. “Apparently I'm overbooked with interviews and the schedule's just been re-written for the umpteenth time. God knows when I'll get an actual free window of time. Can you come straight over? I can't promise I'll be free immediately, but I'll swing it somehow and get away.”

Stiles is in the middle of a breathless _yes yes yes_ when Hale adds, sharp, “Don't tell Finstock who you are, though.”

Then someone's talking to him again, then the call clicks off. 

xxx

The Connaught is impenetrably terrifying, and the discreetly glorious woman on the front desk gives him a once-over that has him classified as _take-out-the-trash_ time. Then re-classified, when he drops the Flintstone password. Her eyes boggle a bit, though. It's clearly hard to believe.

And when he knocks on the door of the suite, he's hardly greeted by Derek Hale and swept off into a private little spot for some alone time. No. The place is loud with shouts and hustle and bustle, busy with official looking people carrying clip-boards and marching about, and there's a little queue of people outside half a dozen doors in the internal hallway. (There are a lot of press passes. Stiles feels deeply uncomfortable, and wishes he knew who the hell _Finstock_ is. This Finstock, to whom he must not reveal his secret true identity. Trouble being, he doesn't know what he _is_ supposed to say to him, either.)

And worse than that, he's stranded, because the pretty girl who opens the door and stares blankly at him, promptly turns and begins continuing an argument, with a nicely built dark-haired guy with thick-rim glasses, about who's responsible for the 2.25 pm fuck-up.

Stiles doesn't _care_ who's responsible, just that it allows him to slip inside quietly, unobtrusively and unchallenged, and keep an eye out for Hale or Lahey, or anyone who looks low enough down the food chain that they might provide him with information, without throwing his ass out. This seems like a real official affair, and Hale's invite is clearly under the radar, if Stiles is supposed to be avoiding certain people, and if he just manages to avoid Finstock –

“Hey, little man, where are you going?” He's arrested, just as he's about to slip into a hallway alcove, dusted with a few chairs, and skulk in safety. And he has a bad feeling when he turns, to be greeted by an early-middle-age guy with bright, light eyes – very bright, slightly manic – and a shock of dark hair, and a grin that's a little bit menacing. “None of the peons pointed you in the right direction? Do I got to do everything around here myself?” He stares off into the distance like he's looking for a lost marble or two, and then spots the dark speccy guy who'd failed to accost Stiles on his way in. “Danny! Come here and find out where this guy's supposed to be! He's just wandering around like a lost puppy, and you know I hate puppies!”

Specs guy – kind of cute, Stiles notices, because he may be in the throes of a growing celebrity crush with some fuel feeding the flames, but he's still _human_ – starts pushing and squeezing his way over through the throng. And this slightly scary dude turns to him again. “What's your name, bub? You lost your name-tag.”

And Stiles figures a fake name isn't going to do him any more favours than the real thing – if he's thrown out on his ass, he's still out on his ass, right? A fake name isn't going to show up on any lists they got, either. Anyway. He's an _invited guest_. Kind of. “Stilinski,” he says nervously, licking his lips. “Stiles Stilinski. I, I'm a sub, the guy they were going to send couldn't make it, I may not show up – ”

And this guy turns back to – Danny? - and roars, unnecessarily really, because Danny has got up quite close by now. “Danny! This guy is Bilinski! Find out his magazine and his slot and point him the way he needs to go!”

He turns, and absently sticks his hand out to Stiles, a clear afterthought. “Finstock, by the way. Hale's manager, Bobby Finstock. Good to meetcha, Bilinski.”


	7. In which Stiles gets mistaken for a pro journalist and fears the Finstock.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Stiles has an assignation with Derek, in the middle of a press junket. He's not going to wind up interviewing Mischa Barton, though, right?

Then he's gone, roaming through the corridor like a migrating wildebeest and suddenly roaring at a minion about doughnuts. Stiles feels kinda like he's just had a brief encounter with a wookie, and is lucky to get away to tell the tale. But a hand slaps his shoulder and pulls him out of his state of slight apprehension, and this guy, Danny, he says, “Okay, Mr Bilinski,” with a definitely cute grin, “let me get a hold of my running list and find out where you're supposed to be and who you're supposed to be grilling. What did you say your paper was?”

Unngh, and fuck, this isn't really that much better than Finstock, apart from the fuckability aspect. Stiles opens his mouth, and nothing comes out. 

It doesn't often happen. His dad, Lydia, Scott, none of them would believe it.

But destiny, and a saviour, swoop down out of nowhere. Or, to be strictly accurate, out of the door opposite them, that suddenly opens up. A ferociously familiar face appears, leaning out and squinting down the hallway. It's Isaac Lahey. Then, he looks up, opposite, and spots Danny. “Danny! Fuck's sake, come and save me from this guy who's putting the screws on about my Dad and my sealed records, all of that. I can't shake him off it but I'm gonna punch him if he doesn't – ”

He's hissing, discreet, but then he seems to come to the realisation that Danny isn't alone, and gives Stiles a narrow-eyed suspicious look. “I didn't say anything, that was off the record, and if you print anything not covered in the contractual agreement I know someone who'll – ”

“Isaac, I'm just taking Mr Bilinski here to assign him to a room,” Danny says hastily. “I'll get right back here and then – ”

No, no, something's snagged Lahey's interest about that. Although it takes a second, two, for it to visibly tick over in his head, his eyes tight on Stiles'. Then he stops looking like a skinny pale Hulk ready to rip someone apart with both his two narrow, aristocratic hands. A slow grin steals across his face, and now he just looks kind of evil. Evil and pleased, evilly pleased. “Yeah?” he says. “Think you might have got the name wrong there, dude. Am I right?” he asks, twitching an eyebrow at Stiles. “ _Stilinski_ , not Bilinski. _Coffee dude_ ,” he adds, like this is the single-syllable explanation.

Now Danny goes still at Stiles' side, and Stiles should be pleased. In enemy territory, he has identified his allies, sought aid and evaded the enemy Finstock. But actually, he feels more like dinner, between two predators. Danny's grip on him is suddenly a lot firmer than it was a split-second ago. “Riiight,” he says, nodding. “That makes more sense than just a random wandering Bambi with... no press pass,” he says, clearly noting it for the first time. “You're lucky Finstock didn't slice and dice you,” he says, direct to Stiles. “What are we going to do with him?” he says to Lahey, and they're both looking at him. “Derek's still tied up with the babe from the Monster Movie Bods website, trying to flirt him into submission and get him to commit to date-dinner-and-dick.”

But Lahey's the one who's Bambi now: he's scanning the hallway as they speak, and his attention is grabbed. “Uh-oh. Finstock heading back at two o'clock. C'mon, dude, I'm swapping you for this asshole.” And with Lahey's hand fisted in his shirt, and Danny levering him from behind, Stiles finds himself boosted forward into the room Lahey's leaning out of, quick enough that maybe they've successfully evaded Finstock's line of sight and fractious, toddlerish, unreliable attention. Better hope so, anyway.

A hapless skinny-suited hipsterish journalist guy is practically the only thing in the room, barring a couple of chairs, cabinets and a coffee-table, and Lahey deals with that. Not with the extreme violence he's been threatening, but with an overdose of only vaguely threatening charm, and a lot of hustle. “Well, it's been great!” he announces, advancing on the guy with a menacing air, letting the signet ring on his middle finger thrum-m-m against the wall of cabinets at the side of the room, shrill and echoey. “And now we're done!”

The guy looks pretty amazed – because clearly, they're not done in any way, shape or form. But there's no gainsaying Lahey once he's got a hold of the guy's hand and is forcibly shaking it, grabbing the guy's digital recorder in the other, and all but lifting him up and walking him to the door of the room. (For a lanky, not obviously built guy, he shows some impressive core strength and flexibility. But then, a personal trainer and luxury home gym probably helps.) 

The door closes on the guy's disgruntled face, still mumbling protests, and Lahey flattens his lanky back against it, folds his arms in his white skinny rib. (It's fetching. The muscle definition. Stiles isn't being unfaithful to his one true crush, or anything, thinking that. Well, not much.) Stiles gets a sidewise smile out of him. It's very... assessing. “So,” Lahey drawls. “Coffee Guy.”

Stiles shifts uncomfortably. He's relatively compactly built, compared to Lahey, but right now he feels as gangly and ungainly as a new colt, or Bambi. “I get the feeling that Hale has led with that, describing me,” he suggests uncomfortably. 

Lahey grins. “Yeah, his account was heavy on the Starbucks aspect,” he agrees. “But there were other details, too,” he adds. “Quite a lot of them.” And his eyes range over Stiles, up and down, back and forth. They range quite freely, and Stiles flushes.

“I'm going to go retrieve him from the Mighty Movie Bods babe,” Lahey says. “It's not like he'll mind. He's probably fighting her off with a hockey stick and the hotel land-line phone as we speak. She is mighty, and takes no prisoners. Catch you in two – but one thing, man.” He gives Stiles a meaningful, eyebrow-action heavy look. “Don't move from here, or I won't know where to find you. Plus Finstock could track you down again, and that would be unfortunate.”

“What is it with Finstock?” Stiles asks. 

“Finstock is a beast,” Lahey says, smiling. “He seeks whom he may devour. And if he _does_ track you down,” he adds, clear light eyes turning suddenly serious, “then whatever else you give away under his torture techniques – even if you crack completely – remember, you never met Derek. You don't even know who Derek Hale _is_.”

“Yeah, right,” Stiles says sceptically, because Jesus, who on the planet hasn't heard of Derek Hale? Leaving alone the fact that he's supposed to be basically _there to interview the guy._ But he's speaking to dead air, because Lahey is out of there, and the door is closing again, on his face this time. 

He's alone in the little, functional hotel room. And he's stuck here while he waits on other people, so there's no point standing around and fretting, getting more and more nervous while he waits. So he sits down, and flicks through a magazine. (Horse and Hound, and why exactly does that ring a bell? He can't quite work it out, and it's infuriating.) 

He sits down, and frets, instead. He frets enough to do a lot of muttering to himself, about what exactly the fuck he's doing here in the first place, and he must be _crazy_ , and if his Dad was here now, he'd... He flicks through the magazine, which has fascinating things to say about wicca and the Queen and X-Factor. (What are these Limey folks all about? What is it with the talent shows and the royalty? He understands better than he did six months ago. But he's never really going to _understand_.) 

He waits, and it takes about twice as long as the very longest he expects to have to wait. Then, he's still sitting there in the small, antiseptically clean, bare room, and he's still waiting. (For someone with his nervous, jibbery, jittery attention span, this ain't good.) Then, it takes _three times_ as long, and he's still waiting. All the time, he's thinking that Finstock, or someone else, could open that damn door at any moment. And although he doesn't precisely understand the significance of Finstock, and why it would be so much worse to be discovered by _him_ as an imposter than by anyone else, it's still enough to render his nerves piano wire with strong hydrochloric acid poured over them. 

Of course when the door finally opens, it's when he's finally given up expecting it every second, and has let his mind finally drift. (It's drifted to thoughts of Lydia and Anna Scott, combined in ways that are never going to happen in this reality, and Stiles thinks he is in no way to blame. He's been left alone and unoccupied for way too long for any guy not to be thinking porn-related thoughts. He's only thankful that he hadn't got to the stage of actually _doing_ anything about it.)

It's Isaac, though, who minimally levers the door open, scooting wary looks out into the corridor like he might get a tap on the shoulder any moment.

Which isn't so bad. After all, it could have been Finstock. Which would have been the end of the world, as far as Stiles can tell, at this point. 

He's just relaxing, because he's been tensed up for anyone, including the worst possible option. And Isaac gives him a quick, sharp grin, like a knife, like a razorblade. And Stiles stops relaxing, abruptly.

He's not alone, that's the thing. Because Derek Hale is who levers himself in, behind Isaac. With his eyes on Isaac's, as they mingle gazes in silent collusion and wariness. But then, as the door clicks, very softly, shut, he swivels his head.

His eyes lock on Stiles', then. And a slight smile gives a faint light to his handsomely saturnine face. (God, was anyone ever more born to play Mr Rochester? Not that Stiles fancies himself as Jane. The bonnet would do nothing for his cheekbones.) 

There's one second, and neither of them say a damn thing, just look at each other. And then a second, the same.

The third second, Isaac coughs, loud and elaborate, and he says, “Well, time for me to get out of here. I've got... toenails to clip. Finstock to avoid. I'm pretty sure I can keep myself busy. Derek...” He pauses, and they look at each other a moment, Senior Heart-throb and Junior Heart-throb having a solemn wordless moment. They appear to be communicating quite adequately, for all that, though. “Watch yourself. Be careful... Be good.”

Derek's face is immobile, perfectly calm as he accepts this admonition. “When am I ever anything else?” he asks, amenable.

Isaac chews his lip. “Yeah,” he concedes. “That's probably the trouble. Anyway I'm outta here. Bye, Coffee Dude,” he says with a wave to Stiles. And he's gone, and the door shut quiet as a cat taking its leave. 

Ooh, awkward. And now they're alone. “Hey, Fred,” Stiles tries, with a little wave, joshing, only a little bit cheery mixed with uneasy. 

There's a wide-eyed wince, at that. Then Hale smiles, but it's a professional performance, and it's not as if Stiles can't tell the difference. He's spent a lot of time watching that face, with a lot of careful attention. “Hey,” Hale says. “Thanks for coming to see me. I just thought we...”

Well, what? Stiles waits, on tenterhooks, but Hale has dried up a bit. “Really ought to see each other again?” he tries, with a head-twitching forward motion that's aiming at cutely perky, but is maybe a bit over-eager. “Should be arranging a second date?” Okay, it's a stretch calling a coffee-incident and a kiss a date, but Stiles is pretty expert at stretching date-definitions. “Should acknowledge our destined fate as star-crossed lovers?” Okay, that last definitely doesn't come out as light-hearted and kidding as he'd like it to have. But a positive response would certainly be nice. 

But Hale's face is getting calmer, more closed-off and shut-in as he speaks. Stiles isn't so dumb he doesn't know how to read that, instant by instant. His chin tenses a little with resolve, when he says, “We shouldn't just leave it the way we did leave it. You want to sit down? I'll make you a coffee.”

And he does, too. There's a coffee-drip, cups and saucers on a tray on the side table. So – in the third coffee-related incident in their beverage-saturated relationship so far – a world-famous film-star makes Stiles a drink. And gently pushes him a little backwards, to sit his ass down on one of the easy chairs, and sit down next to him. 

Yeah, this seems like the brush-off, all right. Which is something that Stiles is intimately acquainted with, and should certainly be used to by now. And Hale takes a sip from his own cup, before he speaks, that is just classic evasion. Playing for a moment to think.

“I shouldn't have...” Hale says, and sighs. He meets Stiles' eyes, and looks like he's trying to weigh him up in just that one look. “Look. It was nice to meet you. You're... uh... clearly an unusual character.” He lifts his eyes to heaven, and Stiles can appreciate the understatement. He knows he can be a little much for a lot of people to take. That has been drilled home to him, multiple times. “But... I'll be out of town again soon. Who knows when I'll be back. I shouldn't have, shouldn't have played along, have...” 

“Kissed me,” Stiles says. At least one of them can say it. 

“Yeah,” Hale says, relaxing visibly. “I mean, I did like you. Apart from the regular drenchings. You've got to take ballet lessons, or something. For the, er, grace-issues. Get a handle on that.”

Yeah, definitely the brush-off. Oh well. 

Stiles has been on the receiving end of this often enough, that he's not eager to wait around and prolong it. He stands up abruptly, and puts a hand out to Hale, to shake. “Okay. I get you. No hard feelings, man. And in case you were wondering, I'm perfectly capable of keeping my mouth shut, too.”

Oh, Christ, the not-quite-imperceptible way that Hale relaxes yet further, at that, is really kind of an insult. So that was what he was worrying about? But Stiles puts a big smile and a brave face on it, because that's what he does. Rejection: no big deal. His skin is thick, and his romantic history is a litany of disasters. Hale does shake his hand, looking a bit disconcerted, a bit brow-furrowed, like this isn't exactly what he wanted or planned. Stiles can't see any other way it could have gone, not really. And he turns to the door, to leave and enjoy his walk of wistfulness and mild embarrassment, the hell out of this place.

He can't, though. Can't, because that's the minute that Finstock bursts through the door, hair levitating like it's trying to get the hell off his manic perky skull, eyes rounder and wilder than they were fifteen minutes ago. “Bilinski!” he cries, and throws his arms before him like this is the greatest news ever, like they're old buddies. “Glad you found your way to where you were meant to be! My buddy Danny help you with that? Great kid, _great_ kid.” His wild eyes drift over to where Derek is standing, every bit as immobilized as Stiles.

Because this is the worst thing, right? He's not sure exactly why. But he's certainly got the message so far: if Finstock discovers the truth, then all is lost. And he should probably flee.

So when Finstock says, “Hey, guys, don't let me interrupt the communication process, right? You sit right down and get on that: I'm just searching for where I put my old hockey stick in this damn warren. So that I can hit your buddy Lahey with it, for being an annoying asshole and taking the last sugar-glazed. Sit down! Sit down! Don't keep the guy on his feet, Derek! Unless you think he's going to chase you around the room any minute! Not another one with a thing for you, is it? Because I got rid of that Mighty Movie Bods woman, but good. Threw her down the service lift shaft for you, after she tried to cop that feel.”

And he grins, and glints at Stiles. Stiles isn't really sure if he's kidding, or not.

But they're kind of stuck, if they're sticking to the story. He sits down. So does Derek. The interview begins.


	8. In which Finstock is a beast, and seeks whom he may devour

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Don't tangle with Finstock, they tell him. So what does Stiles do?

Now, this shouldn't be impossible to navigate and get through. If anything, Stiles could bullshit for America if it was made an Olympic sport. Maybe he hasn't actually seen the film, but he has the basic outline of the plot down, or the main points at least. Plus as far as Hale-related gossip is concerned, he's reasonably genned-up too. 

It's the first thing that springs to mind – the main relationship and pairing, the basis for supposedly sexy and combative sparring interactions throughout the film. (Although several reviews have noted that Argent and Hale, who've acted together often enough before and dated in the past, don't seem to possess the fire and chemistry together that they used to have. Hale's portrayal especially has been described as leaning heavily on the distrust and conflict aspect of the plot, and much less on the sparky attraction the two thieves are supposed to exhibit.) 

So he spools it together, the first question, lets his mind spin it out even as his mouth is open and he's talking. “Thanks for the interview, Mr Hale,” he begins, politely, flashing Derek a wink. Derek acknowledges it with a faint grin, and a fainter shrug, that all but says, _we're stuck, we're here, better play along huh?_

“No problem,” Hale says, with a broad, easy grin that's something you rarely see in his on-screen roles, moody and troubled and brooding as they tend to be, heavy on the angst. It's heart-stopping. Stiles can feel his heart stop, shrug, throw in the towel with this over-rated beating business. 

“So,” Stiles says, steepling his fingers together and doing his best to look meditative, thoughtful, and above all else, an actual real-life pro journalist – not that Finstock appears to be taking a blind bit of notice, he's too busy fiddling with the small table in the corner, and trying to reach down the back of it, presumably in pursuit of the cherished hockey stick that he's looking for. “You and your co-star, Ms Argent. I hear you used to be an item, back in the day: how did that reflect on the filming process. Any awkwardness about playing old lovers with, well, an old lover?” And he perks one eyebrow up, perky and irrepressible and charming as he knows how to be. (It's never worked on Lydia, or his Dad, or anyone else when it was important. But it's still worth trying.) 

But no, no, oh no, it wasn't worth trying. Or something wasn't, in any case – because it hasn't gone down well. From tolerant, amused, only a little tense what with the silly farce of the situation and Finstock's presence – Hale has snapped upright from where he was lounging in his chair, and his face is white and his jaw tensed. If you were a romance novelist, you could say that his eyes are blazing. Heck, Stiles is willing to say it anyway. He's reminded of spotting Hale – surely it was Hale – outside his back-yard wall, the other night. Then, his eyes had seemed to flash red in the neon glow of the street-lights – now, they're closer to a cold neon-blue in the brutal strip-light of this little room. But either way, there's something wrong in those beautiful almond-shaped thick-fringed eyes, pretty enough for any girl. Stiles can't tell quite what it is, fury or grief or despair or imminent danger, or has a Dementor just sucked out his soul? Marginally, Stiles might lay odds on the last. 

And if only that were all. It's not only Hale who's gone from relatively laid-back – at least in relation to Stiles – to contemplating the funeral of this afternoon's pleasant start. No, Finstock's joining in the homicidal fun. From being bent over that table – and cheerily cursing, scrabbling around for something that's clearly not there, wherever he's mislaid it – he's dead upright fast enough for a nice little back injury, and bristling, suddenly, with offence and rigid fury. Directed at Stiles, of course. 

“What the ever-lovin' fuck?” That's Finstock, but it might as well be either of them. “Did you not _get_ the memo about acceptable and non-acceptable interview questions? Or didja just not bother to read it, sonny?” From upright, two quick strides have brought him to stand – or tower, or loom – over Stiles. He's red in the face. Fury's not pretty on Finstock. “Or maybe you get a kick outta poking at people's sore spots, right? Are you a malicious tool, or just a cretin?” Then he leans in closer, distaste warring with the fury on his features. “Get out. Just get out.”

Stiles' heart is stuttering like a BB gun, like sniper fire, and if his panic attacks were brought on by shock rather than emotional distress then he might be in danger of one. His mouth drops open, and words fail him, which isn't a thing that happens a lot. But Derek's hand on his arm... well, it only makes his heart rabbit harder and his shock worse, until he turns, and looks.

Derek's calm, now, after that flash of intense horror or emotional turmoil. And he gives Stiles' arm one pat, quick, before he stands and puts a hand on Finstock's chest, and eases him back gently. Which is good, because any further forward and he'd be bare inches from Stiles' face, glaring and sweating. 

Finstock doesn't want to go, it's clear, but he gives and moves a little when Derek turns him a little away from Stiles, a little towards himself. “Hey,” Derek says, voice calm, all sweet reason, pretty amazing after his own initial reaction. “It's okay. It's okay, I'm okay. It wasn't deliberate, I think maybe Danny's new assistant has been a little overwhelmed by the rush, I don't think everyone got the addendum to the pre-interview agreement.”

“My ass they didn't,” Finstock snarls. “I double and triple checked every magazine and website we've got in today, made sure they all got a copy and understood it was non-negotiable. This little asshole needs to --”

Derek puts a hand up, at that, to quell what's probably going to be a stream of profanity. “No, it's not a problem. It's not. Look, that stick isn't in here, maybe you should go get Danny to track it down for you. Let me finish up in here, and we can talk about this later. You worry too much.”

It's a weird vibe. You could read it as quarreling lovers (and that's almost too weird for Stiles to process or compute, looking at Finstock). But no: it's more like Finstock as fretting mother-hen, and Hale as a now-adult kid uneasily negotiating freedoms and boundaries. With someone who still thinks of him as a fourteen year old teen-star, maybe.

Which: that's not a regular management/client relationship, right? 

And it's not like Finstock is amenable anyway. “Like hell,” he says, getting red in the face again. “That little shit,” he says, turning back to Stiles with disagreeable intent in his eyes, “has crossed the line, and he's outta here _now_. He can just be careful not to let the door hit 'im on the ass on the way out. And he can leave via the door or the service elevator, depending on how quick he gets the hell out.”

He's moving in on Stiles – and Stiles is standing, now, wary and balanced on the balls of his feet, checking the triangulation between himself and Finstock and the door. “Okay, okay,” Stiles say, holding his hands up, and taking a careful step towards the door. “I guess I've overstepped my bounds, here, and I should definitely have – ah – read the advance info better. So I'd just like to apologise for any and all offence I may have inadvertently caused, and, uh, get the hell out of here. No service elevator shaft short-cut necessary,” he emphasizes, giving Finstock a wary look. Who is cracking his knuckles, and looking disappointed at the news, if anything. 

But he's not really sure, and he doesn't really want to leave, like this, basically thrown out and undignified – he can see why he was supposed to avoid Finstock at all costs, now – and without even really any decent kind of goodbye from or to Hale. This isn't the way to go out, is it, surely? He looks to Derek, because Derek could contradict him, could tell Finstock to get the heck out and let the interview proceed, could make him stay...

Derek just looks mostly conflicted. He may be speaking to Stiles only with his eyes, and it could be soulful as heck, but Stiles can't tell what he's saying with it. He sighs, scritches the back of his neck, looks at Finstock, looks at Stiles. “Well...” he says.

Stiles shrugs, 'cause he may be the world's worst at getting the hint, but you've got to admit defeat sometime. “Well, uh, thanks for the interview, then. What there was of it.” And he makes tracks, shows his back, and gets out of that little room. (Trailing no paperwork, no recording equipment, zilch and nada and fuck-all, all of which Finstock has signally failed to notice. Maybe if he'd been trailing a hockey stick around, unsuccessfully concealed upon his person, maybe then Finstock would have noticed _that._ ) 

And Finstock leans out of the room as Stiles begins to make his way down the crowded little hallway, edging around mini-queues and earnest, gossiping hipstery spectacled interns and people walking out of other suddenly opening doors, loudly in mid-conversation. “That's right, Bilinski,” Finstock yells – roars, actually. “And don't come back! Cruella isn't welcome in the castle! What's this? You were, are, and always will be nada! We don't have a candy machine in the boy's room!”

And Stiles isn't incredulous, 'cause that wouldn't cover it. He's still making tracks – partly because Finstock's a mature well-muscled guy who probably has fifteen or twenty pounds on him, and he's not entirely sure that that bit about the service elevator shaft was a joke or an empty threat. But also he's revolving, now, as he does it, to get a good look at this wild-haired red-faced lunatic asylum escapee, as he leans out of that door and hollers at Stiles. He's not the only one staring, although most people – whose jobs and livelihoods probably depend on Finstock's goodwill in some way – are a lot more discreet about it than Stiles needs to be at this point. 

Mostly, he just can't believe what he just heard. That last bit. Even when he finds himself yanked sideways at the end of the corridor – when he'd been intending to head to the other side through the doors to the stairwell – and just as a grumbling glaring Finstock ducks his head back into that little room, presumably judging Stiles near enough safely off the premises and no threat to his liddle widdle baby client. (Who isn't in evidence anywhere, who has abandoned Stiles to his fate, who doesn't give a damn, clearly. Oh well. Be like that. Stiles doesn't care either. No he doesn't.) 

Like a comedy slapstick routine, like getting yanked off-stage by a shepherd's crook, he's jerked off to the side round the bend in the corridor, and... Stiles has had enough, at this point, honestly. He jerks himself right back out of the hands of whoever's trying to manhandle him – because no to the service elevator shaft, all right? He's leaving gracefully! He doesn't need any assistance! Then, straightening his shirt collar and collecting his dignity, he gets a load of who it is who's blocking his path. Oh.

“Hi,” Lahey says, looking him up and down expectantly, like someone expecting a progress report. “And if you were wondering, yeah, that last bit he was yelling? _Pretty In Pink_. He uses that on a regular basis. You gotta wonder about a middle-aged man with a hockey stick and a porn channel subscription, whose favourite film is an 80s brat-packing teen-girl romance classic.”

“Don't diss Ally Sheedy, man,” Stiles begins automatically, because he did once write an entire essay – middle school domestic science, not media studies – about the significance of Jon Cryer's seminal role in John Hughes' ouvre and his subsequent fall from grace, finally descending to the shambles of _Two And A Half Men_. The bemused teacher had given him a B-, for the sake of perfect research, end-notes and SpaG, even in completely the wrong subject.

But he shakes himself out of that particular digression, because? Other things on his mind. “Sounds like it didn't go so great?” Lahey says, his eyebrows doing a complicated and highly rhythmic samba that says _tell me more._

Stile shrugs. “I guess I said the wrong thing, I don't know what exactly. Anyway Finstock stumbled over us – are you hiding his hockey stick or something? He pretty much threw me out, and your friend Hale – well.” Stiles shrugs. “I guess he's said anything he had to say to me.”

Lahey looks less amused, a bit more human now. “He didn't stop Finstock going into full enraged-gorilla rant mode?” He sighs. “What did you say, anyway?” His eyes get harder, sharper, like little chips of silver-grey diamond. “Christ, you didn't say that it was basically a date, that you're not a writer? Did you? Fuck it...”

And that's a little jab to Stiles' pride and his feelings that's a little bit too much, now. He pulls out of Lahey's grip, and heads over for the doors, the stairwell, keeping a weather-eye out for Finstock amidst the tightly-packed chattering mass. “Why would I say it was a date?” he asks, and if he's a little bitter then, well, he hopes he doesn't sound bitter. That would betray how dumb he's been to have hopes in the first place. “It wasn't a date.”

He's shoving the door open and two, three steps down the first flight when Lahey shoves the shutting door back open, and calls after him from the landing of the stairway. His voice is annoyed, but urgent too. “So what did you say? Why did he throw you out?” he calls after Stiles. 

Stiles can't remember now. It's all kind of a blur, and though he kept his composure well enough actually face to face with Finstock – well, he kept as much composure as he ever has ready to hand, anyhow – he's beginning to feel a lot more shook up and wounded now. The trauma of it is blooming like a nasty hurtful rose, not ebbing away now he's got away from the scene of the conflagration. 

He doesn't stop, going down the stairs, and he doesn't even turn back a little as he hollers back, letting it echo out. “I don't know, I don't care. I wish I'd never come, either. You guys are nuts, and I hope the film tanks. Have a terrific afternoon!”

And he's out, he's gone, and that was an unpleasantly bracing resolution to what Stiles had expected to be the funnest adventure he'd had in, well, probably ever. He'd thought he was heading for a date, or a flirtation, or a hook-up even, and... But getting angry is probably better for his mental health than getting hurt, and he steams on the Tube all the way back into work. And when Martin and Boyd get a load of his face they don't even ask what's wrong, don't even push to hear about where he's been and what he's been up to.

Stiles spends the afternoon in an uncharacteristically glowering and steaming silence, slamming books around under the guise of shelving, and selling a couple of expensive coffee-table travel-books by terror-based sales tactics that include invasion of personal space and glare-offs. He makes _Rufus_ buy a book. At least it's profitable for the business.

He's calmer when the shop shuts, the register-balancing and tidy-up and locking up are done and he heads home. Greenberg's out, thank Satan: Stiles passes out on the sofa in front of a specially bitchy episode of _Come Dine With Me_ , and it's past seven when his phone wakes him up, with a Taylor Swift ringtone designed to get his butt up and answering and silencing annoyance. 

Lydia, it's Lydia. What the hell? Sure, she's already advance-warned him that she's intending to come over, but that's it, he's barely heard from her since, what with her being busy with picking up end-of-semester awards and organising prestigious science internships and research positions. As far as online presence is concerned she's practically disappeared, though he's too used to it when she's snowed under with More Important Things to be offended. 

“Lyds?” he opens, wondering if it's a misdial. “What is this going to be costing you? Why didn't you just skype me? Is it an emergency? Is everyone okay?” His stomach jolts with dread and anxiety. “Is my _Dad_ okay? Is Scott okay? Fuck it, is _Jackson_ okay?” He's suddenly trembly, because he's had too much stress today, and he's down one parent, and London is cool and everything and he _has people_ but actually sometimes he's fucking lonely and Greenberg is no help with that and...

“Stiles,” Lydia snaps, and he's glad of the whole Little House On The Prairie schoolmarm thing she has going, because sometimes it really helps to pull him out of pre-panic states. “All your precious and important people are fine. Just fine. And I'm calling you this way because...” And her voice is a little smug, and she goes, “Taaa-daaa...” like someone building up anticipation.


	9. In which Stiles is miffed.  And a Skype call.  And has a visitor again.  Note that I don't say 'another visitor'.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> He gets knocked down, but he gets up again... With some help.

Stiles is willing to play this game with her, too. Best bud, and all, and he has the reassurance that there's no other imminent disaster looming in the wings to trip him up. In fact, it's nice to see her, even in 2-D on a laptop screen. In fact, he feels like he's never needed to see her more. Her froth of ginger waves, the prickly pursing of her glossed-up pout, are the light of his life, and a lifeline that might prevent him slumping into a trough of murky despair right now. Accompanied by a _Breaking Bad_ marathon to depress him that wee bit more, and one Sainsbury's microwaved readymeal after another, because who needs fresh food or vitamins when they're in the slough of despond? It's not like his Dad is gonna see. He can live on curly fries and poptarts for the next eighteen months, return home with fifty extra pounds on his ass just to make that extra bit sure he's headed for a lonely loveless future. 

Waaaah. Hey, he's had the queen of rough days. He's entitled. 

And he can't be hiding it too well either, because when he does his best to look excited, leans in and makes with the grabby hands, pastes a smile on his face – his sad miserable face – and says, “Yeah? Come on, Lydia! You want to answer to my Dad if I die of suspense, huh?” then it doesn't go over big.

Instead she stays quiet, stares at him through the glare of the screen a moment, and purses her mouth up like she's working on something particularly knotty for her _Special Quantitative Problems and Naughty Numbers_ class. “Stiles?” she says. “What's up with you? There's something wrong. Your lips are twitching. And you look more skittish and attention-deficit than usual, which is going it some. Has anything happened?” She pauses. “Anything connected with Hale?”

He kinds of hates Lydia's power of super-perceptive brainwaves, sometimes. His grimace probably tells the tale. “Naw, don't be ridic, Lyd,” he lies, though, valiantly, only a little more handsy and ants-in-his-pants delivering the lie. It's probably harder to read through two screens and a continent or two, an ocean. At any rate she lets it pass. For now: and probably mostly because she has big, big news herself that's just aching to spill out. Stiles is too well-versed in her ways and her wiles to think that he's likely got away with it altogether. For now is good enough, for now. 

“So anyway,” she says, pointing at him with one perfectly manicured claw, “who's having a house-party tonight?”

Er, not Stiles, at least as far as he knows. Not unless Greenberg has signally failed to warn him of impending plans, which wouldn't be the first time. But it would spell Greenberg's doom, after everything else he's pulled lately. “Uh, you, I guess?” he ventures. There's _just the two of them_ there. Who else?

“And the prize goes to the gentleman with the buzzcut and doughnut frosting on his chin,” Lydia announces. She's flailing her arms about and scrunching up her face and Stiles is a bit worried, frankly. This is more excitement than Lydia would ever normally deign to display. She's... bouncing. Actually bouncing. This is a Lydia that he's never seen, a Lydia as excitable five year old, and Stiles thinks he's justified in being maybe a little bit scared. “And _where_ am I having a house-party?”

“Lydia, I'm a little bit scared,” he says bluntly. “And hell if I know. Your house? You know, as best guess? You know, the one in Arlington, student housing, that you've been sharing with Erica and the dissociative fox-girl for the last nine months?”

When Lydia rolls her eyes it highlights her pretty pearly grey eyeliner, and what an immaculate job she's done of her mascara. Which she already knows, of course. “She isn't DID, Stiles, she's otherkin. And I would go to all the trouble of pointing out that my house is about to be rocked to you because...? Use your brain, Stiles. Do you ever listen to one word I say? Be careful with your answer to that. I could hurt you.”

Lydia setting him puzzles, asking him impossible questions, sending him on quests for his lady's favour. He feels kind of like he's back in kindergarten, or at least grade school. And racks his brains faithfully, because _boy_ has she got him trained. A dim light dawns, too. It's not like she didn't warn him. It's just that he's had a lot on his plate lately. A hell of a lot. Things have been a lot more eventful in the old Stilinski lovelife than he's used to, even if not notably any more successful than usual. 

It's way out of the blue, though. He's had no warning whatsoever: not what he'd _call_ a warning.

“You're _not_ in London...?” he says, and he'd say it slow and incredulous, if he could say anything slow. He says it with a grip on his lap-top and staring into the screen, and it probably makes him look like a boggle-eyed insect under the microscope. 

“Oh my God, I _am_ in London!” Lydia cries out, flinging her skinny little arms up in the air, and the pretty silver-bell peals of her laughter are only a little tinny across the ether. “I'm in Paddington, sweets! Mom weaseled authorisation out of my father to put his name on a short lease, while I look around at European grad programs over the summer! Pretty amazing, huh?”

Stiles has to physically push his dropped jaw back up. “ _Paddington?_ he asks.

And Lydia snickers a little, just as pretty as her silver bells but a heck of a lot more sly. “Yeah, my dad forgot to stipulate an upper limit for quarterly rent. By the time he notices it'll be... well.” She visibly slumps a little. “He has a new girlfriend, some trainee beautician community college popsy. He won't notice, or if he does I can guilt him into formally okaying it. Anyway.” She brightens up, and extends a long pointy hand at him. If she was here in person she'd be poking him in the chest. “I want YOU to come and destroy my house-warming party tonight! You have an hour tops before I expect you to be raiding the refrigerator, breaking expensive new toys while under the influence, hogging the tequila and nosing around in my pantie drawers!”

“Hey!” Stiles protests, because, wow, unfair! Destruction? Bogarting? Pantie drawers? (Okay, maybe that last one.)

All he gets in response is a twitchy eyebrow and a contemptuous look. He can't see through the limits of the screen, but she probably has her hands on her hips. “Based on experience, Stiles. Long and bitter and twisted experience,” she says, pouting at him. “Now, put something on your back that isn't that rag you're almost wearing, and get your ass over here within the hour. Because this place is AWESOME, and you need to see it!”

Okay. Okay, okay. By the time he's done and they cut the call he's committed, in fact, to attendance, to getting his ass over to Paddington within an hour, hour and a half tops. And he's seeing his co-equal captain of best-friendness, right here in the UK, this very evening! And she's living over here! (Temporarily, maybe.) In Paddington! (Jesus Christ, Anna and _William_ don't even live in Paddington. Fair play to 'em, they generally live in hotels that cost a Paddington rent per night, but even so.) 

It's awesome, it's turned a sucky day right around into a triumph, and he punches the air as he heads for the bathroom to begin an intensive prep and pretty-making for the gala evening ahead. Derek who? Like he gives a damn, right now. _Lydia and Stiles_ , best buds forever and on the same continent, is officially back _on_. International filmstars are officially surplus to requirements. International filmstars, in fact, can _suck it_. 

And he mostly means it, too. 

Anyhow, eight minutes later, when he streaks through the first-floor hallway wearing a towel, a few droplets of water from the shower and a grin, he's feeling pretty A1 prime, ready for action, as he breezes back into his bedroom.

Breeze is the word. The fucking window's open again, and that's the first thing he focuses on. (That, and pulling the towel a little tighter around his waist, as goose-pimples pop up to say _hello_ on every inch of skin he has exposed. Which is most of them.) And the second thing that he focuses on, as his gaze tracks sideways to the little movement in his peripheral vision, is.

_That_.

Derek Hale is in his bedroom. (Again? Again. Stiles Stilinski's bedroom, hotspot for international celebrities everywhere.) And not only that. Not only that, but Hale hasn't even turned around to greet him, and Stiles is pretty sure that he didn't miss Stiles' entry into the room. Partly on account of the fact that Stiles was, up until the last shocked second or so, singing. A prime rendition of Ed Sheeran's latest, in fact. Tribute to gingers everywhere, in honour of Lydia and her welcome irruption into his sad lonely Brit-infested existence. And possibly dancing, a little bit. Maybe it's better that Hale had his back turned, after all.

Stiles clears his throat. He's pretty sure he's not hallucinating. This will be his first night out in a week or more, he hasn't had so much as a _cheeky half at a 'Spoons_ for days. “Anything I can help you with, there?” he says, trying for insouciant. And distanced. Insouciant at a distance, that's the thing. International celebrity with a penchant for breaking and entering? Fuck it, maybe there are other things that his publicists keep quiet from the adoring fans. Homicidal ones. Maybe Stiles was lucky to get dumped without even the most sketchy relationship to get unceremoniously ejected from. “Maybe something in the English cosy line, or a little paranormal romance? Oh no, silly of me, I nearly forgot – we're _not in the frigging bookshop!_ This is my _house_! And,” he says, warming up a little bit – because the guy rejected him, what, not five hours ago? And now he's tracked Stiles down - again - and invited himself in, and he's making himself at home? “And, yeah, I know I said _mi casa es su casa_ , but I think you've taken it a bit too literally. And you know what, it's one thing to politely tell me not to get my hopes up and it was nice knowing me – and it's completely another to turn up in my fucking house not a day after doing it. For what? A social call? What the hell are you _doing_ here?”

He's a little bit breathless when he's done. Maybe he's gone overboard a bit, going off on one with his famous non-sweetie. But still. It's a bit much. It's a bit off, as Wooster might say. 

And at least it gets Hale's attention, gets him to turn around with the same impassive face he wears in his films when a cadet rookie on the force is unwisely needling him, or his cop-bro has been taken out by the Mob and he's giving the eulogy at the funeral. “I wanted to apologise,” he says. It's probably the best non-comeback comeback he could have used. It takes the wind out of Stiles' sails, for sure. But not that, as much as seeing what it is he was looking at, spread out on Stiles' desk.

Well, if Stiles has a small – but highly curated – selection of celeb magazines in his possession, what of it? (And if they largely seem to have covers, or major articles, that heavily feature one Derek Hale, then it's purely a coincidence. It's a coincidence. Shut the fuck up.)

And if Hale is now in possession of that interesting little titbit of information... Well, what of it. Fuck him. It's a _phase_ – or it _was_ a phase. One that he's definitely outgrown. As of about three p.m. this afternoon, to be precise. What does Stiles care what Hale thinks about it?

Hale isn't looking at his highly specific and professional Cinematic Studies collection anymore anyway. And whatever opinion he has about the Hale Collection (curated by Stilinski, S., M.F.A., soon to be screenwriter to Hollywood - or, worst case, a few interesting indie European productions via his highly influential – read, William – contacts), it looks like he has more important things on his mind. Stiles has seen the man brood for a living, up on the silver screen. He's witnessed him brooding _professionally._ And still, he's never seen him brooding quite like this. His forehead's all knotted up with tension and worry, and his pretty cupid's bow is pursed up like life fed him lemons and he didn't have the nous to chuck 'em back.

He's not exactly meeting Stiles' eyes. It's like he's trying, but something in him just keeps saying _no_. And he's dried up in his lines, and if he did that in his films more often then he's be more mean mute and moody than he already is, which is a) superfluous and b) impossible.

“ _Apologise_ ,” Stiles says, with a bit of emphasis. “What did you want to apologise for?”

Well, of course he knows. And really, technically, he doesn't think Hale has much to apologise for. He also doesn't think that an apology is going to make him feel any better about the whole mess, if that's the aim. An apology isn't going to be _enough._ It's all ass-backwards to how he feels about this tiny little damp-squib of a non-thing.

Putting Hale on the spot this way maybe isn't the smartest thing, either. His mouth is tight suddenly, and there's something approaching a glare from those eyes, their shifting hues too darkened to make out. He doesn't like being put on the spot. “For letting Finstock throw you out, today,” he says, though, even though it's ground out of him like rump steak through a meatgrinder. But his face relaxes a bit, once it's out. “And,” he adds, hesitating, with a sudden sharp darting glance at Stiles, “for being... I didn't mean to be – dismissive. I should have dealt with it better, taken you out somewhere for a drink to talk. I'm just so fucking over-scheduled all the time and trying to fit everything in and it's...” He stops, re-starts like a stuttering car. “I did want to do better by you than that. I did like you – I mean, I like you. It was more important to me to get to talk with you than it probably seemed.”

There, and that's the finish, the wind-down. Stiles can tell by the little huff of a breath Hale gives, the faint sag of his shoulders, having got it all out into words. 

He doesn't even know what he thinks about it. He's still feeling the adrenalin trembles of having stumbled without warning over a major film-star shuffling papers about on his bedroom desk. He's still trying to find words for a polite way to say, once again so it gets through, that this is _his fucking bedroom_ and what is Hale doing in it and what are phones fucking _for_ anyway?

But Hale's found his own words, which seem to vaguely approximate to _I'm sorry_. Which is great, probably, except that Stiles is still kind of pissed at him, and also not very dressed, and with somewhere urgent elsewhere to be very shortly, or there'll be hell to pay from Lydia. Lydia! He has so little time before he's going to be in big trouble, he hasn't got time for superstar angsting in his private chambers!

Lydia... In fact, that sacred name sets off a spark in his brain. Never mind hand-wringing and regrets: Stiles can think of a much more concrete way for Hale to express his contrition for the most humiliating rejection and exit in his inglorious and unimpressive dating life. “So, you really feel bad about me having to haul ass out of your fancy hotel suite, with your crazy manager threatening to throw me down a lift shaft for looking at you funny?” he asks abruptly. 

And it seems like Stiles really isn't the most sneaky when it comes to calling in a well-owed favour, however aslant his approach. Hale gets this wary look on his pretty face, and all of his body language screams _rethink_ and _retreat_ and gets angled towards the still-open window. (Stiles' nipples are standing up and saluting the Queen, and may launch into a rendition of _God Save The Queen_ any moment, whether the trad or Pistols version.) Well, it's too bad, because Hale has bought into this, and Stiles is calling in the debt. 

“Yeah,” Hale says, eyes flicking towards the window, back to Stiles, to the window... “I do.” He's clearly compelled by innate honesty and a sincere feeling of obligation and indebtedness, when he'd obviously sooner make like Mo Farrar on no stimulants whatsoever, right, and hare for the hills. 

“Well, then,” Stiles says decisively. “If you want to make it right, forget the hand-wringing and nice-mannered home invasions. Do me one favour and we're evens, you can strike it off your list for the confessional and forget I ever threw coffee down your terrifyingly ripped bod.”

Hale relaxes a little, smooths a hand down his nice, thin, highly tailored dark-blue shirt – he really hasn't dressed for a cat-burglar outing in British weather – and gives Stiles an estimating, assessing look. It looks like he's thinking it might be worth _one_ errand or task, to get Stiles off his conscience. Depending on the favour, of course. “What would it involve?” he asks, cautiously. And his fingers stray behind him, over the magazine covers largely decorated with a very familiar face. It's visible right there, the uncertainty in his eyes, regarding hanging out with a possible stalker. 

But who's stalking who, that's the question. Stiles would reckon, if challenged, that Hale is pulling out ahead on the issue. It gives him confidence in dealing with his quarry. “You've gotta come with me to a friend's party tonight. It'll make her night, she's new in town, it'll be awesome. Couple of hours, meet 'n' greet, a few drinks... I'll be your bodyguard if anyone gets over-enthusiastic. What d'ya say? Wanna be my plus-one?”


End file.
